BOTM 27 Final Spoiler
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BOTM 27 Final Spoiler
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Kennigit
proud 2 boxer
I started the game and played until I gave up pretty quickly.
This is strictly off of my quick memory from the day the game started, so I may be mistaken in my information. No screenshots. But....
I settled on the dye, and had a decent start. If I remember correctly, I founded to the lower right first. Was there gold over there- if there was, that was my 2nd city. I got ~ 2 other cities, with a 5th planned. My 3rd city was between my 2nd city and my capital, and my 4th was down to the left and south (near one of the AI's iirc). My fifth was going to be founded south of me.
Horses were in the fat cross when founded on the dye iirc, but if it wasn't I had horses to defend against barbarians. However, I didn't get the horses up very quickly, and that's where I messed up the most. I had a chariot out heading to protect my 4th city (which the map made it tough for chariots to move 2 squares at a time) and I didn't see an archer get onto the horses. I messed that up, and I believe that the horses got pillaged.
But, the worse problem was an archer attacked my 4th city as my chariot went over there. Now, I had a warrior in the city, and I slaved another warrior when the archer was right next to the city. The archer attacked, killed one warrior, but took no damage
. It then killed the city (the city was pop 2 when it slaved, so went to pop 1).
Now, I think the angle it came from it had favourable odds, but still, I thought the 2 warriors would protect the city. I quit after that; my tech wasn't as good as I would have liked, and my game wasn't that great. Plus, I wasn't holding that high of tech despite having gold.
I'm fuzzy on the details, but I was really mad that the archer killed my city so easily. I simply messed up- I should have gotten the horses earlier. And my horse was pillaged unneccessarily, where I delayed building a chariot for another settler or worker (I didn't see the archer when I could have).
This is strictly off of my quick memory from the day the game started, so I may be mistaken in my information. No screenshots. But....
I settled on the dye, and had a decent start. If I remember correctly, I founded to the lower right first. Was there gold over there- if there was, that was my 2nd city. I got ~ 2 other cities, with a 5th planned. My 3rd city was between my 2nd city and my capital, and my 4th was down to the left and south (near one of the AI's iirc). My fifth was going to be founded south of me.
Horses were in the fat cross when founded on the dye iirc, but if it wasn't I had horses to defend against barbarians. However, I didn't get the horses up very quickly, and that's where I messed up the most. I had a chariot out heading to protect my 4th city (which the map made it tough for chariots to move 2 squares at a time) and I didn't see an archer get onto the horses. I messed that up, and I believe that the horses got pillaged.
But, the worse problem was an archer attacked my 4th city as my chariot went over there. Now, I had a warrior in the city, and I slaved another warrior when the archer was right next to the city. The archer attacked, killed one warrior, but took no damage
. It then killed the city (the city was pop 2 when it slaved, so went to pop 1).Now, I think the angle it came from it had favourable odds, but still, I thought the 2 warriors would protect the city. I quit after that; my tech wasn't as good as I would have liked, and my game wasn't that great. Plus, I wasn't holding that high of tech despite having gold.
I'm fuzzy on the details, but I was really mad that the archer killed my city so easily. I simply messed up- I should have gotten the horses earlier. And my horse was pillaged unneccessarily, where I delayed building a chariot for another settler or worker (I didn't see the archer when I could have).
adrianj
Deity
First spoiler here
*** Session 5: 500 AD -> 1000 AD ***
I am first to Music in 560 AD - I'm saving the GArtist for a later golden age. Next target is Education, which I learn in 740 AD. I'm the first to it, and start on Liberalism while building Unis (revolt to slavery/Org.Rel. to whip them out). Peter is my nearest tech rival, but doesn't have Edu or Philo yet.
By 1000 AD I've researched my way to within 1 turn of Liberalism. I've traded Education to Peter for Guilds, since I want to aim to get either Replaceable Parts or Rifling as the free tech. He doesn't have Philo yet so I still have some time. Oxford Uni will be built next turn.
In general I'm preparing my empire for war.
*** Session 6: 1000 AD -> 1500 AD ***
1090 AD I find Peter can research Liberalism, so I take it and claim Replaceable Parts for free. Lots of forests get Lumbermills now. Rifling is next, learned in 1150 AD. Time to save cash and upgrade some troops.
I know where Mao's main stack is, and I put my Rifles in a forest nearby. I declare in 1220 AD. It didn't have quite the immediate effect I was hoping for so I move my units into Chinese lands. The next turn Mao sacrifices half his stack for 0 losses
The war drags on and on until 1370 AD. I get Nappy involved (big mistake!) and I manage to take two of Mao's cities, but I sue for peace as the war weariness is getting high, and Nappy and Peter are starting to tech in front of me. Shortly after Mao capitulates to Nappy. I'm at a bit of a loss for what to do from here. I'm actually considering switching over to a cultural game.
By 1400 AD I do just that. Time to start massing missionaries, spreading the good word.
I take a break at 1500 AD and have a look at the situation.
*** Session 7: 1500 AD -> 1800 AD ***
I am a very weak civ sitting between two super powers. Nappy is pleased, so there is still a 10% chance he could declare war on me each turn - unless it is worse than that since he has a vassal. Peter is friendly, so not a threat right now, but we don't share a religion so it is borderline. My problem here is that I am aiming for culture - yet I don't want to switch to Free Speech for fear of losing Peter's favourite civic bonus.
What I really need is a defensive pact, and hope that keeps the dogs of war at bay.
I get Privateer problems by my Moai city, so trade out Steel to Peter for Astro, and quickly upgrade a trireme.
In 1535, Nappy is friendly with me, and willing to sign a DP. Peter doesn't yet have Military Tradition... I sign the DP, and suddenly find Peter no longer Friendly. Errr. Ok, I bribe Peter into Organised Religion so we can be buddhist buddies again. It's expensive (490
) but I'm hoping it's worth it. And then a few turns later, he converts to Christianity! Gah! It's not all doom and gloom - he is pleased at least. But I feel like I'm on a knife edge - I have a pair of frigates and lots of Rifles, these guys have transports, destroyers and infantry.
In 1610 something strange happens - Mao breaks free from Napoleon. I thought that was pretty difficult considering he capitulated. Now I have an angry neighbour. Nappy switches to UniSuffrage as well, so I lose the favourite civic bonus with him, now he is only pleased. Yip, pretty tense.
*** 1800 AD -> 1900 AD ***
Napoleon is building SS parts. This will be pretty damn close, even if I don't get invaded.
In 1850 I do my maths and find when I'll win. 3 turns later my GP Farm generates a Scientist at 5% odds... gah. This will delay my finish date by at least 8 turns. With SS parts being built everywhere!
In 1868, still ~15 turns to finish the UN proposes universal suffrage for global civic. I vote no, but should have defied - Napoleon is only pleased. Napoleon is researching Future Techs...
In 1878 Thebes goes legendary. I've completely mucked up all the GPs, and only have 1 lying around.
In 1890 AD Napoleon has launched! I'm not entirely sure how long it will take to land, but I'm hoping it is less than 5 turns...
In 1900 AD Hatshepsut has won a cultural victory! Hah! In your face Napoleon!
*** Summary ***
That was definitely one of the more intense games I've played. I probably made it much harder on myself than I should have. The real turning point was when I changed from a military strategy to a cultural game. Normally if I pursue culture I've been thinking about it from the beginning, or at least before the ADs. Consequences of this late (~1400 AD) decision were:
1. My Great Artist farming was completely borked. I started off favouring scientists for bulbing (built GLid in GPFarm), then merchants for trade missions, and in the end I was only able to bomb 3 great artists. I even had one artist completely spare at the end since cities #2 and #3 went legendary the same turn regardless of if I'd bombed either of them. What I needed was 1 more great artist! (Stupid GS at 5%...)
2. I took Replaceable Parts from Liberalism. It seemed great at the time, but I could have taken Nationalism soooo much earlier and basically have been done with teching - maybe just a little further for Constitution to be on the safe side.
3. I hadn't planned which cities would be my legendary ones. I could have had so many more cultural buildings built (instead of Rifles!) and had my religions spread round much sooner.
Things I did particularly well:
1. My economy was in great shape up to when I started warring. I actually had a tech lead through the middle ages.
2. I'm especially happy with my diplomacy. I had both Napoleon and Peter Friendly with me for 80% of the game, and no worse than Pleased. Defensive pacts with these two most powerful players was the most likely reason that Mao (I was his worst enemy) didn't declare on me, despite him having tanks and mech infantry to my riflemen.
3. I won
*** Session 5: 500 AD -> 1000 AD ***
I am first to Music in 560 AD - I'm saving the GArtist for a later golden age. Next target is Education, which I learn in 740 AD. I'm the first to it, and start on Liberalism while building Unis (revolt to slavery/Org.Rel. to whip them out). Peter is my nearest tech rival, but doesn't have Edu or Philo yet.
By 1000 AD I've researched my way to within 1 turn of Liberalism. I've traded Education to Peter for Guilds, since I want to aim to get either Replaceable Parts or Rifling as the free tech. He doesn't have Philo yet so I still have some time. Oxford Uni will be built next turn.
In general I'm preparing my empire for war.
*** Session 6: 1000 AD -> 1500 AD ***
1090 AD I find Peter can research Liberalism, so I take it and claim Replaceable Parts for free. Lots of forests get Lumbermills now. Rifling is next, learned in 1150 AD. Time to save cash and upgrade some troops.
I know where Mao's main stack is, and I put my Rifles in a forest nearby. I declare in 1220 AD. It didn't have quite the immediate effect I was hoping for so I move my units into Chinese lands. The next turn Mao sacrifices half his stack for 0 losses
The war drags on and on until 1370 AD. I get Nappy involved (big mistake!) and I manage to take two of Mao's cities, but I sue for peace as the war weariness is getting high, and Nappy and Peter are starting to tech in front of me. Shortly after Mao capitulates to Nappy. I'm at a bit of a loss for what to do from here. I'm actually considering switching over to a cultural game.
By 1400 AD I do just that. Time to start massing missionaries, spreading the good word.
I take a break at 1500 AD and have a look at the situation.
*** Session 7: 1500 AD -> 1800 AD ***
I am a very weak civ sitting between two super powers. Nappy is pleased, so there is still a 10% chance he could declare war on me each turn - unless it is worse than that since he has a vassal. Peter is friendly, so not a threat right now, but we don't share a religion so it is borderline. My problem here is that I am aiming for culture - yet I don't want to switch to Free Speech for fear of losing Peter's favourite civic bonus.
What I really need is a defensive pact, and hope that keeps the dogs of war at bay.
I get Privateer problems by my Moai city, so trade out Steel to Peter for Astro, and quickly upgrade a trireme.
In 1535, Nappy is friendly with me, and willing to sign a DP. Peter doesn't yet have Military Tradition... I sign the DP, and suddenly find Peter no longer Friendly. Errr. Ok, I bribe Peter into Organised Religion so we can be buddhist buddies again. It's expensive (490
) but I'm hoping it's worth it. And then a few turns later, he converts to Christianity! Gah! It's not all doom and gloom - he is pleased at least. But I feel like I'm on a knife edge - I have a pair of frigates and lots of Rifles, these guys have transports, destroyers and infantry.In 1610 something strange happens - Mao breaks free from Napoleon. I thought that was pretty difficult considering he capitulated. Now I have an angry neighbour. Nappy switches to UniSuffrage as well, so I lose the favourite civic bonus with him, now he is only pleased. Yip, pretty tense.
*** 1800 AD -> 1900 AD ***
Napoleon is building SS parts. This will be pretty damn close, even if I don't get invaded.
In 1850 I do my maths and find when I'll win. 3 turns later my GP Farm generates a Scientist at 5% odds... gah. This will delay my finish date by at least 8 turns. With SS parts being built everywhere!
In 1868, still ~15 turns to finish the UN proposes universal suffrage for global civic. I vote no, but should have defied - Napoleon is only pleased. Napoleon is researching Future Techs...
In 1878 Thebes goes legendary. I've completely mucked up all the GPs, and only have 1 lying around.
In 1890 AD Napoleon has launched! I'm not entirely sure how long it will take to land, but I'm hoping it is less than 5 turns...
In 1900 AD Hatshepsut has won a cultural victory! Hah! In your face Napoleon!
*** Summary ***
That was definitely one of the more intense games I've played. I probably made it much harder on myself than I should have. The real turning point was when I changed from a military strategy to a cultural game. Normally if I pursue culture I've been thinking about it from the beginning, or at least before the ADs. Consequences of this late (~1400 AD) decision were:
1. My Great Artist farming was completely borked. I started off favouring scientists for bulbing (built GLid in GPFarm), then merchants for trade missions, and in the end I was only able to bomb 3 great artists. I even had one artist completely spare at the end since cities #2 and #3 went legendary the same turn regardless of if I'd bombed either of them. What I needed was 1 more great artist! (Stupid GS at 5%...)
2. I took Replaceable Parts from Liberalism. It seemed great at the time, but I could have taken Nationalism soooo much earlier and basically have been done with teching - maybe just a little further for Constitution to be on the safe side.
3. I hadn't planned which cities would be my legendary ones. I could have had so many more cultural buildings built (instead of Rifles!) and had my religions spread round much sooner.
Things I did particularly well:
1. My economy was in great shape up to when I started warring. I actually had a tech lead through the middle ages.
2. I'm especially happy with my diplomacy. I had both Napoleon and Peter Friendly with me for 80% of the game, and no worse than Pleased. Defensive pacts with these two most powerful players was the most likely reason that Mao (I was his worst enemy) didn't declare on me, despite him having tanks and mech infantry to my riflemen.
3. I won
shyuhe
Deity
Domination in the 1500's.
Fun map! The large land area available wasn't so bad since we were a creative civ. I hit 20% land very very early and was worried I'd completely tank my economy but I somehow made it through the big 3 (alpha, currency, col). The other AI were VERY backwards but they weren't willing to be bribed into war. I did beg from Nappy and Peter a lot to make sure I didn't become their war target. Unfortunately, I couldn't bribe from Mao since he was the heathen on the map. Of course that meant I ended up taking a dow from him in the midgame, costing me a fairly decent city (triple deer).
Of course what made the situation worse was that Nappy had already warred once with Mao and dogpiled Mao when Mao declared on me (I was in 10 turn peace at the time). Nappy had a large army though, and quickly capitulated Mao before I even realized he could do it. I hoped that he would break free though as Mao still had lots of land. He eventually did just as I was nearing liberalism. I quickly geared my empire towards cuirassiers/cavalry and assaulted Mao before he could get a good defensive tech. He had protective LB but not many pikes so it wasn't too bad.
After eliminating Mao, I quickly healed my troops and made my way over to Nappy. I declared on him and quickly grabbed his fringe cities. There was a huge gap in power and Peter was way above both of us in power at the time, so Nappy capitulated very quickly (war success!). I managed to take him out while keeping his sod intact, so I then healed again and prepared to assault Peter this time. Peter was going up the SM--physics--communism line so I figured I had a decent window with cavalry.
Lo and behold, I caught his sod just after it had attacked Nappy's. Both were parked on the eastern edge of the continent in a former barbarian city. It was about a 40-50 unit stack that got obliterated in the span of about 2 turns. I had been building secondary stacks near the Russian border so they went to pick off his satellite cities while my sod healed. Once healed, they set out and chewed through his cities.
Just as I was nearing domination, Peter finally managed to get rifles. Of course by this point it was far far too late, as he was down to a meager 5 (or was it 4?) cities by this point. Since I was going to trigger domination anyways, I took the capitulation for the extra points. Peter was so kind to even give me a free city as part of the deal
All in all, it was loads of fun. I had thought about playing this on deity but I'm glad I didn't - I think the extra land would have been way too painful to deal with. Oh and I did come very very close to losing the game to a religious victory. Mao had built the AP in Hindu and just after I had conquered a Hindu city from him, he held a vote for AP leader (thank goodness he couldn't call holy war on me!). I sat there looking at the stats for a good 5 minutes before I convinced myself that Mao couldn't win. Thank goodness Firaxis disallowed the self-vote diplo victory!
Fun map! The large land area available wasn't so bad since we were a creative civ. I hit 20% land very very early and was worried I'd completely tank my economy but I somehow made it through the big 3 (alpha, currency, col). The other AI were VERY backwards but they weren't willing to be bribed into war. I did beg from Nappy and Peter a lot to make sure I didn't become their war target. Unfortunately, I couldn't bribe from Mao since he was the heathen on the map. Of course that meant I ended up taking a dow from him in the midgame, costing me a fairly decent city (triple deer).
Of course what made the situation worse was that Nappy had already warred once with Mao and dogpiled Mao when Mao declared on me (I was in 10 turn peace at the time
). Nappy had a large army though, and quickly capitulated Mao before I even realized he could do it. I hoped that he would break free though as Mao still had lots of land. He eventually did just as I was nearing liberalism. I quickly geared my empire towards cuirassiers/cavalry and assaulted Mao before he could get a good defensive tech. He had protective LB but not many pikes so it wasn't too bad. After eliminating Mao, I quickly healed my troops and made my way over to Nappy. I declared on him and quickly grabbed his fringe cities. There was a huge gap in power and Peter was way above both of us in power at the time, so Nappy capitulated very quickly (war success!). I managed to take him out while keeping his sod intact, so I then healed again and prepared to assault Peter this time. Peter was going up the SM--physics--communism line so I figured I had a decent window with cavalry.
Lo and behold, I caught his sod just after it had attacked Nappy's. Both were parked on the eastern edge of the continent in a former barbarian city. It was about a 40-50 unit stack that got obliterated in the span of about 2 turns. I had been building secondary stacks near the Russian border so they went to pick off his satellite cities while my sod healed. Once healed, they set out and chewed through his cities.
Just as I was nearing domination, Peter finally managed to get rifles. Of course by this point it was far far too late, as he was down to a meager 5 (or was it 4?) cities by this point. Since I was going to trigger domination anyways, I took the capitulation for the extra points. Peter was so kind to even give me a free city as part of the deal
All in all, it was loads of fun. I had thought about playing this on deity but I'm glad I didn't - I think the extra land would have been way too painful to deal with. Oh and I did come very very close to losing the game to a religious victory. Mao had built the AP in Hindu and just after I had conquered a Hindu city from him, he held a vote for AP leader (thank goodness he couldn't call holy war on me!). I sat there looking at the stats for a good 5 minutes before I convinced myself that Mao couldn't win. Thank goodness Firaxis disallowed the self-vote diplo victory!
My game plan and spoiler up to 500AD are found here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8923535&postcount=10
Basically, I played for a military VC and had things pretty well under control until I got dogpiled. That's about all I need to say, but since I wrote more in my notes, you can read more if you wish....
1000AD: I am whipping population mercilessly. ”We cannot forget your cruel punishment” for the next 40 turns in a now pop5 city, formerly pop12. I have 9 cities, so max production would be 9 units per turn… I don’t quite reach that level but for a period of about10 consecutive turns I averaged about 6 units per turn. Ruthlessness.
I am able to hold off Mao because when his stack arrives it is purely 1-dimensional – nothing but mounted units (incl 2 war elephants). Won’t require a lot of spears to hold that one off. I now have a GG-medic3, which is a godsend.
Napoleon as expected has DOW’d me. Its 3-on-1 time, after hundreds of years at 2-on-1 and holding on. I slaved down the two coastals to almost nothing, and cleared out all the units but the one built on the turn of French attack. But I see an opportunity to hit them in the soft underbelly, and send a 3 war chariot party out to take a city protected by one archer and one axe. Keep or raze? I know Napoleon can take it back if he wants it, but I do not raze, hoping that it will make a peace offering if Nappy will ever talk to me. This strategy fails as Napoleon takes it back a few turns later but still won’t talk. At least it split his stack in 3 pieces, none of which is unmanageable by itself, which should give me time to re-group and hold my core cities. 3-on-1 and nobody will talk… you might have well put the Always War setting on. :/ But I am astounded that I am holding on this long, and begin to look forward to tomorrow’s hangover from the whip.
Then, after almost a whole milleneum of pouting, Peter will finally talk. He wants St Petes for peace but he’ll have to pry it from my cold dead hands. He sneers at my offer of Literature (literature in 1000AD, LOL), but greedily snaps up Literature plus all my cash = 38 gold. I’m all the way up to 20% research so I can spare it (thanks to merchant specialists from my markets). I have Civil Service and am a few turns from Metalscasting on my way to machinery, so I guess Peter figures I might actually survive and won’t be very happy with him.
Now its 1250AD and Mao will talk. That’s good, because he is starting to bring up catapults protected by longbows. All his previous catapults were unprotected and easily dispensed. What kind of terrible intelligence does that kind of thing?? (Besides myself, I mean). Now the big question is: Will I have mace in time. Best not to ask that… the whip has slowed my specialist economy a bit, and I haven’t really gotten around to making cottages with all this war going on, so it's a question best not asked. Lets hope he’ll take something I can afford to give. One on one with Nappy might get me back my east coast, or I could open borders with Mao and get Nappy by the back door to raze Paris. In my dreams, anyhow.
That's the end of my notes. (There's a clay tablet that archeologists uncover thousands of years later with the mysterious statement "kcd_swede shall return!") What happened? Well, the AI each only had to fight one civ (me) whereas I had to fight 3. Their land had now been cleared enough for their cottage economies to start moving. Their stacks turned into mace about the same time I got maces. I finally decided that I would have to give a core city (Pyramid/Horse city) to Napoleon for peace since he could take it soon anyhow. I had to give my Heroic Epic city to Mao for the same reason. I figured I could at least try to shift to a religious/culture strategy since I can plant two more cities in my cult borders. I start spreading Mao's AP religion... but shortly after the 10 turns forced peace is over, Napoleon DOW's me again. I'm Peter's worst enemy as well, and he's had time to reload.
But Mao used the AP to stop the war against me. He has 366 votes to my 76... so religious VC no longer seems that practical. And Nappy/Petey aint plannin' to let me live long enough for a culture victory. So Mao proposes a religious victory vote, and instead of voting for myself (and making the religious victory fail) I voted for Mao. He wins. Game over. Call it Religious Surrender. Circa 1380AD.
I have mixed feelings about this game. I feel I handle the actual warring and its economic demands quite well, much better than ever before on this level. Too bad I sucked up every other aspect of this game.
My lessons: (1) Building wonders when I plan for lots of war is stupid. Building Pyramids on Immortal level is very questionable in any situation. Going to representation was worth roughly 3 or four hired scientists across my empire, and it would have been cheaper/better to just hire them. (2) Wars are often won or lost on diplomacy. I replayed the AD portion of this game and found that I could get Mao and Napoleon fighting against each other as I took care of Peter. THAT's what I should have done in the first run-through. I'm not sure it would work because it made Mao much stronger... but I'd have defeated Russia, at least. (3) When you have a civ down, do not consolidate and build wonders... use any pause to build troops to finish the job you started. (4) Get Ironworking a LOT earlier if you plan war. Hooking up metals first at 1AD is inexcusable. (5) Feudalism should have been higher priority than Machinery -- but Pyramids steered me away from early Monarchy -- one more reason NOT to build the Pyramids.
After losing like this I have a tendency to feel like I suck at this game. But a more honest appraisal... surviving 1000 years of "always war" on Immortal level doesn't suck. But there isn't so much margin for error (going to war without taking care of your backyard first) at this level, and I will likely continue to make this kind of mistake since I haven't the patience to mull over every choice on every turn. Just having fun.
Thanks for a challenging game. Can't wait for next month!
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8923535&postcount=10
Basically, I played for a military VC and had things pretty well under control until I got dogpiled. That's about all I need to say, but since I wrote more in my notes, you can read more if you wish....
1000AD: I am whipping population mercilessly. ”We cannot forget your cruel punishment” for the next 40 turns in a now pop5 city, formerly pop12. I have 9 cities, so max production would be 9 units per turn… I don’t quite reach that level but for a period of about10 consecutive turns I averaged about 6 units per turn. Ruthlessness.
I am able to hold off Mao because when his stack arrives it is purely 1-dimensional – nothing but mounted units (incl 2 war elephants). Won’t require a lot of spears to hold that one off. I now have a GG-medic3, which is a godsend.
Napoleon as expected has DOW’d me. Its 3-on-1 time, after hundreds of years at 2-on-1 and holding on. I slaved down the two coastals to almost nothing, and cleared out all the units but the one built on the turn of French attack. But I see an opportunity to hit them in the soft underbelly, and send a 3 war chariot party out to take a city protected by one archer and one axe. Keep or raze? I know Napoleon can take it back if he wants it, but I do not raze, hoping that it will make a peace offering if Nappy will ever talk to me. This strategy fails as Napoleon takes it back a few turns later but still won’t talk. At least it split his stack in 3 pieces, none of which is unmanageable by itself, which should give me time to re-group and hold my core cities. 3-on-1 and nobody will talk… you might have well put the Always War setting on. :/ But I am astounded that I am holding on this long, and begin to look forward to tomorrow’s hangover from the whip.
Then, after almost a whole milleneum of pouting, Peter will finally talk. He wants St Petes for peace but he’ll have to pry it from my cold dead hands. He sneers at my offer of Literature (literature in 1000AD, LOL), but greedily snaps up Literature plus all my cash = 38 gold. I’m all the way up to 20% research so I can spare it (thanks to merchant specialists from my markets). I have Civil Service and am a few turns from Metalscasting on my way to machinery, so I guess Peter figures I might actually survive and won’t be very happy with him.
Now its 1250AD and Mao will talk. That’s good, because he is starting to bring up catapults protected by longbows. All his previous catapults were unprotected and easily dispensed. What kind of terrible intelligence does that kind of thing?? (Besides myself, I mean). Now the big question is: Will I have mace in time. Best not to ask that… the whip has slowed my specialist economy a bit, and I haven’t really gotten around to making cottages with all this war going on, so it's a question best not asked. Lets hope he’ll take something I can afford to give. One on one with Nappy might get me back my east coast, or I could open borders with Mao and get Nappy by the back door to raze Paris. In my dreams, anyhow.
That's the end of my notes. (There's a clay tablet that archeologists uncover thousands of years later with the mysterious statement "kcd_swede shall return!") What happened? Well, the AI each only had to fight one civ (me) whereas I had to fight 3. Their land had now been cleared enough for their cottage economies to start moving. Their stacks turned into mace about the same time I got maces. I finally decided that I would have to give a core city (Pyramid/Horse city) to Napoleon for peace since he could take it soon anyhow. I had to give my Heroic Epic city to Mao for the same reason. I figured I could at least try to shift to a religious/culture strategy since I can plant two more cities in my cult borders. I start spreading Mao's AP religion... but shortly after the 10 turns forced peace is over, Napoleon DOW's me again. I'm Peter's worst enemy as well, and he's had time to reload.
But Mao used the AP to stop the war against me. He has 366 votes to my 76... so religious VC no longer seems that practical. And Nappy/Petey aint plannin' to let me live long enough for a culture victory. So Mao proposes a religious victory vote, and instead of voting for myself (and making the religious victory fail) I voted for Mao. He wins. Game over. Call it Religious Surrender. Circa 1380AD.
I have mixed feelings about this game. I feel I handle the actual warring and its economic demands quite well, much better than ever before on this level. Too bad I sucked up every other aspect of this game.
My lessons: (1) Building wonders when I plan for lots of war is stupid. Building Pyramids on Immortal level is very questionable in any situation. Going to representation was worth roughly 3 or four hired scientists across my empire, and it would have been cheaper/better to just hire them. (2) Wars are often won or lost on diplomacy. I replayed the AD portion of this game and found that I could get Mao and Napoleon fighting against each other as I took care of Peter. THAT's what I should have done in the first run-through. I'm not sure it would work because it made Mao much stronger... but I'd have defeated Russia, at least. (3) When you have a civ down, do not consolidate and build wonders... use any pause to build troops to finish the job you started. (4) Get Ironworking a LOT earlier if you plan war. Hooking up metals first at 1AD is inexcusable. (5) Feudalism should have been higher priority than Machinery -- but Pyramids steered me away from early Monarchy -- one more reason NOT to build the Pyramids.
After losing like this I have a tendency to feel like I suck at this game. But a more honest appraisal... surviving 1000 years of "always war" on Immortal level doesn't suck. But there isn't so much margin for error (going to war without taking care of your backyard first) at this level, and I will likely continue to make this kind of mistake since I haven't the patience to mull over every choice on every turn. Just having fun.
Thanks for a challenging game. Can't wait for next month!
beestar
subdeity
Goal: cultural victory on Immortal. Whipping/chopping an army of axemen to conquer the world seemed a bit boring so instead I went for a fast cultural win. I was worried about barbs with so much slow-expanding forest, and also about claiming enough land with the reduced number of AIs. So the major goals were to expand fast, and maintain the peace without conquering a neighbour.
There were some surprises ...
Expansion (A bit of this is repeat from First Spoiler)
I settled on the Dye which was great for accelerating the early worker techs (especially since Egypt's starting techs were rather useless). First settler went southwest to create Memphis a massive GP Farm. That site had 1 corn and 5 deers, each worth 5
! 
Arboria has a huge amount of food ...
Heliopolis (City 3) went northwest to claim 4 deer / 3 horse site. Clearly a powerful city, but I had some problems with the city growing too fast, and working unimproved tiles. Should have spent more time in Slavery or pumping out workers - I didn't really have enough workers for this map.
Elephantine (City 4) went far southeast to claim the double-gems site. My goal was to expand to the eastern ocean, but leave a gap to the west so Peter and Mao would border each other, causing conflict. Not sure if this really worked but I did manage to claim the resources to the east (Ivory, Gold, Spices, Gems). Did a pretty decent job of blocking out land and with so much food cities could be tightly packed in.
I had to settle a suboptimal Pi-Ramesses to beat Napoleon's settler to an iron resource. He settled in place instead, but a few turns later gave up the city to me. Fear Egyptian globalised culture hegemony!
In 475AD I've captured the northeast barbarian city (one War Chariot after French swordsmen killed off all the barb defenders but one). However, Nappy stole the southeast barbarian city - I was 1 unit short from being able to capture the city on my turn. He would hold on to that tiny purple dot for the rest of the game, even though I had 78% Egyptian culture in it. He had to station several dozen units there to prevent it from revolting to me ...
In the end this was enough space, and with my good culture expansion I had lots of ability to fill in yellow tiles with additional cities. Ended up with 14 cities, which was second behind Monster Peter.
Here's the map of expansion:
Free Speech Is For Wusses
To my vast surprise, I was able to found Hinduism on T39 (2480BC). This was slightly useless as I didn't want to invest hammers in early missionaries. I did get Oracle for COL and the free missionary. In general, my diplo was poor - Peter and I were Confucian for a while, but he went to FR soon. I converted Mao to Confucianism but he later founded Judaism (after I got COL!) and switched to that. And Nappy was Buddhist all game. I probably didn't spend enough effort on missionaries. As a result, I spent much of the game nervously eyeing my Cautious neighbours.
When you go for Culture, obviously you use Free Speech ...
... unless you've got Peter the Great in WHEOOHRN with a large stack on your borders. Then you use Nationhood and draft 20 macemen and musketmen.
Fortunately I didn't need to tech fast, and with my high cultural slider I could offset a lot of draft anger. After 10 turns of drafting, somehow Peter dropped out of WHEOOHRN - not something I'm used to seeing. Whew.
In 1585AD Mao used the AP to cancel all deals with the infidel Napoleon, which was bad for diplo since Nappy refused to talk for the next 250 years. Napoleon was in WHEOOHRN for a while with his 30 Cuirassiers garrisoning a 2-tile city being pushed by my culture.
So, when Rifling was available I went back into Nationhood to draft up some 24 Riflemen (and deleted some obsolete units - they're very expensive when you're also running Pacifism to pump out some Great Artists!). I had two cities constantly producing Cavalry/Cannons as well.
In 1700AD Mao decides to WHEOOHRN and build up to attack Napoleon and avenge his earlier war ... except, in 1725AD, the whee-horn goes and it's me that Mao's stack of Cuirassiers and Riflemen is invading! Not a good idea with me at 1.5X Mao's power rating, but all my forces are to the south to guard against the Russians, so it's back to the drafting board.
10 turns later, I've conquered Macao and Nanjing, and Mao capitulates to me with 10 turns before Cultural Victory. I've never fought such a late (successful) war when gunning for Culture.
Culture Victory tips
In contrast to BOTM26, in this game there were plenty of religions available to me for cathedrals, so I spread Judaism (AP religion for the hammers and votes), Buddhism (my state religion to be friendly with Nappy; spread everywhere for Organized Religion), and Confucianism (shrine gold).
I learned something in this game - when running such a high cultural slider in the final push, cottages are useless in your non-Legendary cities. They just end up pump out a bunch of useless culture. Instead, in those secondary cities I paved over all the cottages with workshops and farms, and had them either build Wealth or run merchant specialists to keep the culture slider up.
Got Sistine Chapel for the bonus culture (very important).
Missed Liberalism on T164 (1040AD) - unfortunate, but not game-breaking.
Missed Parthenon by 1 turn - would have been a nice boost to GA production
Missed Statue of Zeus by 1 turn - would have been good culture + GA points
Missed Taj Mahal by 1 turn - this sucked because I didn't have Marble.
Basically acres and acres of forests were converted to gold instead of to culture - a frustrating waste.
On the other hand, I managed to culture-flip Yakutsk, which contained Shwedagon, Statue of Zeus, Wall Street (not enabled because I didn't have 6 banks), and the Great Library.
Finally, I probably should have used Memphis as just as a GP Farm, and not as one of my 3 Legendary cities. I had to build too many things in one city: National Epic, Wonders for Great Artist points, Temples and Cathedrals for the culture multiplier. On top of that, it was my Confucian holy city, so I build Market/Grocer/Bank* there as well.
* sorry vicawoo ... I thought about it!
Conclusions
Overall, this wasn't a highly efficient cultural victory, thanks to the diplo mess and need to spend thousands of hammers on units. But I was happy with the flexibility of my empire and its ability to fight a victorious late war. Result: cultural victory in 1824AD (T282)
- This was the first time I had cause to build the worst unit in the world, the Ironclad. Sayonara, Russian Privateers!
- Here's Peter's Wonder roster at the end of the game. I had to check again to see that he wasn't Industrious.
Tech timeline in spoilers
There were some surprises ...
Expansion (A bit of this is repeat from First Spoiler)
I settled on the Dye which was great for accelerating the early worker techs (especially since Egypt's starting techs were rather useless). First settler went southwest to create Memphis a massive GP Farm. That site had 1 corn and 5 deers, each worth 5
! Arboria has a huge amount of food ...Heliopolis (City 3) went northwest to claim 4 deer / 3 horse site. Clearly a powerful city, but I had some problems with the city growing too fast, and working unimproved tiles. Should have spent more time in Slavery or pumping out workers - I didn't really have enough workers for this map.
Elephantine (City 4) went far southeast to claim the double-gems site. My goal was to expand to the eastern ocean, but leave a gap to the west so Peter and Mao would border each other, causing conflict. Not sure if this really worked but I did manage to claim the resources to the east (Ivory, Gold, Spices, Gems). Did a pretty decent job of blocking out land and with so much food cities could be tightly packed in.
I had to settle a suboptimal Pi-Ramesses to beat Napoleon's settler to an iron resource. He settled in place instead, but a few turns later gave up the city to me. Fear Egyptian globalised culture hegemony!
Spoiler :
In 475AD I've captured the northeast barbarian city (one War Chariot after French swordsmen killed off all the barb defenders but one). However, Nappy stole the southeast barbarian city - I was 1 unit short from being able to capture the city on my turn. He would hold on to that tiny purple dot for the rest of the game, even though I had 78% Egyptian culture in it. He had to station several dozen units there to prevent it from revolting to me ...
In the end this was enough space, and with my good culture expansion I had lots of ability to fill in yellow tiles with additional cities. Ended up with 14 cities, which was second behind Monster Peter.
Here's the map of expansion:
Spoiler :
Free Speech Is For Wusses
To my vast surprise, I was able to found Hinduism on T39 (2480BC). This was slightly useless as I didn't want to invest hammers in early missionaries. I did get Oracle for COL and the free missionary. In general, my diplo was poor - Peter and I were Confucian for a while, but he went to FR soon. I converted Mao to Confucianism but he later founded Judaism (after I got COL!) and switched to that. And Nappy was Buddhist all game. I probably didn't spend enough effort on missionaries. As a result, I spent much of the game nervously eyeing my Cautious neighbours.
When you go for Culture, obviously you use Free Speech ...
... unless you've got Peter the Great in WHEOOHRN with a large stack on your borders. Then you use Nationhood and draft 20 macemen and musketmen.
Fortunately I didn't need to tech fast, and with my high cultural slider I could offset a lot of draft anger. After 10 turns of drafting, somehow Peter dropped out of WHEOOHRN - not something I'm used to seeing. Whew.
In 1585AD Mao used the AP to cancel all deals with the infidel Napoleon, which was bad for diplo since Nappy refused to talk for the next 250 years. Napoleon was in WHEOOHRN for a while with his 30 Cuirassiers garrisoning a 2-tile city being pushed by my culture.
So, when Rifling was available I went back into Nationhood to draft up some 24 Riflemen (and deleted some obsolete units - they're very expensive when you're also running Pacifism to pump out some Great Artists!). I had two cities constantly producing Cavalry/Cannons as well.
In 1700AD Mao decides to WHEOOHRN and build up to attack Napoleon and avenge his earlier war ... except, in 1725AD, the whee-horn goes and it's me that Mao's stack of Cuirassiers and Riflemen is invading! Not a good idea with me at 1.5X Mao's power rating, but all my forces are to the south to guard against the Russians, so it's back to the drafting board.
10 turns later, I've conquered Macao and Nanjing, and Mao capitulates to me with 10 turns before Cultural Victory. I've never fought such a late (successful) war when gunning for Culture.
Culture Victory tips
In contrast to BOTM26, in this game there were plenty of religions available to me for cathedrals, so I spread Judaism (AP religion for the hammers and votes), Buddhism (my state religion to be friendly with Nappy; spread everywhere for Organized Religion), and Confucianism (shrine gold).
I learned something in this game - when running such a high cultural slider in the final push, cottages are useless in your non-Legendary cities. They just end up pump out a bunch of useless culture. Instead, in those secondary cities I paved over all the cottages with workshops and farms, and had them either build Wealth or run merchant specialists to keep the culture slider up.
Got Sistine Chapel for the bonus culture (very important).
Missed Liberalism on T164 (1040AD) - unfortunate, but not game-breaking.
Missed Parthenon by 1 turn - would have been a nice boost to GA production
Missed Statue of Zeus by 1 turn - would have been good culture + GA points
Missed Taj Mahal by 1 turn - this sucked because I didn't have Marble.
Basically acres and acres of forests were converted to gold instead of to culture - a frustrating waste.
On the other hand, I managed to culture-flip Yakutsk, which contained Shwedagon, Statue of Zeus, Wall Street (not enabled because I didn't have 6 banks), and the Great Library.
Spoiler :
Finally, I probably should have used Memphis as just as a GP Farm, and not as one of my 3 Legendary cities. I had to build too many things in one city: National Epic, Wonders for Great Artist points, Temples and Cathedrals for the culture multiplier. On top of that, it was my Confucian holy city, so I build Market/Grocer/Bank* there as well.
* sorry vicawoo ... I thought about it!
Conclusions
Overall, this wasn't a highly efficient cultural victory, thanks to the diplo mess and need to spend thousands of hammers on units. But I was happy with the flexibility of my empire and its ability to fight a victorious late war. Result: cultural victory in 1824AD (T282)
- This was the first time I had cause to build the worst unit in the world, the Ironclad. Sayonara, Russian Privateers!
- Here's Peter's Wonder roster at the end of the game. I had to check again to see that he wasn't Industrious.
Spoiler :
Tech timeline in spoilers
Spoiler :
Fluroscent
Emperor
Settled on dye, built 2nd city to the SW and chopped GWall there. Founded city3-4 and started massing some chariots to up power ranking and capture barb cities, but this part got mucked up badly by the RNG. First lost 5 taking a barb city at the SE gems, then failed to capture a city to the NW with four archers, even though I had 10 chariots...
Napoleon happily waltzed in and grabbed it afterwards
Mentally gave up the though of winning a fastest award then, and instead focus on winning by dom, getting a decent score. Plan - build Kremlin.
I actually built the GWall in my future GP-farm, and I thought I'd either get the GSpy earlier or an earlier GS instead. Turned out I got the GS at ~40% odds, used on academy in capital, because of short term considerations (capital obviously not the best commerce site long term). In the end of the expansion phase, I held nine cities, spanning the continent from east to west, and, even though I expanded more south than north, Peter the expander built 17 cities! (I guess that was expected). Fortunately, he could easily be brought to friendly with bureau. I took a shot at Oracle (because only Nappy had PH), and took currency, since I didnt want to risk waiting 15 turns to complete CS, and MC was not of much immediate value, and only around 100 beakers more expensive. Currency kickstarted my economy, and I began pulling away in techs. The first goal was to get to democracy, taking an as expensive tech from liberalism on the way as possible. Had to grab constitution because Peter pretty much beelined liberalism ?? (before guilds+even engineering!)
After democracy, it was on to communism to start some serious cash rushing, planning to power to domination with cuirs-cavalry, supported by spy revolts. Used the Gspy to steal mil.trad. and began building ~9 cuirs/2 turns until I had a nice bunch of them. Unfortunately, Nappy was WHEOOHRN, and had a rather large stack of cuirs+musketeers of his own, so I thought it best to give Mao communism+democracy+~2500 gold to DOW Nappy.
This worked out well, until it went bad. First Nappy plowed through two Chinese cities, then Peter was bribed in by Mao, bringing him up to tech parity (and close to cossacks...), then I pulled the trigger. Nappys cities fell fast, the one with the biggest stack bribed to revolt. But he still had a large stack in china, so once his main cities were finished, I accepted his capitulation. Now, at this point, two things were bad. I realized domination required 70% land, and Peter had captured one of Nappys cities. Thus I would have to fight Peter eventually.. Not a bright prospect given his huge empire and cossacks making my cavalry weak.
But a blessing in disguise perhaps? I had started building rifles instead, and working on steel for cannons, it was actually smooth while backstabbing Mao for a while. Nappy took one of his cities that I left with one unit
, but of course, Mao capitulated to Peter..
A huge russian stack based in the former french city went on a rampage and captured four former french cities. I had just switched to FR, thus could not immediately switch to drafting (a lesson for the future - when in danger of a backstab, dont make marginal civic changes). I had to pull a bunch of units back to create a stalemate, but would need cannons to break him down. Fortunately, I had enough cavalry to finish Mao off, with the help from Nappy.
In the end, I barraged Peters stack of ~40 cavalry+rifles with ~12 cannons and took it out to finally reclaim all the northlands. 100% culture and one russian city taken, and domination was achieved, sometime in the 1600's.
Excellent game. Very demanding, but still managable with a good strategy.
Napoleon happily waltzed in and grabbed it afterwards
Mentally gave up the though of winning a fastest award then, and instead focus on winning by dom, getting a decent score. Plan - build Kremlin.I actually built the GWall in my future GP-farm, and I thought I'd either get the GSpy earlier or an earlier GS instead. Turned out I got the GS at ~40% odds, used on academy in capital, because of short term considerations (capital obviously not the best commerce site long term). In the end of the expansion phase, I held nine cities, spanning the continent from east to west, and, even though I expanded more south than north, Peter the expander built 17 cities! (I guess that was expected). Fortunately, he could easily be brought to friendly with bureau. I took a shot at Oracle (because only Nappy had PH), and took currency, since I didnt want to risk waiting 15 turns to complete CS, and MC was not of much immediate value, and only around 100 beakers more expensive. Currency kickstarted my economy, and I began pulling away in techs. The first goal was to get to democracy, taking an as expensive tech from liberalism on the way as possible. Had to grab constitution because Peter pretty much beelined liberalism ?? (before guilds+even engineering!)
After democracy, it was on to communism to start some serious cash rushing, planning to power to domination with cuirs-cavalry, supported by spy revolts. Used the Gspy to steal mil.trad. and began building ~9 cuirs/2 turns until I had a nice bunch of them. Unfortunately, Nappy was WHEOOHRN, and had a rather large stack of cuirs+musketeers of his own, so I thought it best to give Mao communism+democracy+~2500 gold to DOW Nappy.
This worked out well, until it went bad. First Nappy plowed through two Chinese cities, then Peter was bribed in by Mao, bringing him up to tech parity (and close to cossacks...), then I pulled the trigger. Nappys cities fell fast, the one with the biggest stack bribed to revolt. But he still had a large stack in china, so once his main cities were finished, I accepted his capitulation. Now, at this point, two things were bad. I realized domination required 70% land, and Peter had captured one of Nappys cities. Thus I would have to fight Peter eventually.. Not a bright prospect given his huge empire and cossacks making my cavalry weak.
But a blessing in disguise perhaps? I had started building rifles instead, and working on steel for cannons, it was actually smooth while backstabbing Mao for a while. Nappy took one of his cities that I left with one unit
, but of course, Mao capitulated to Peter..A huge russian stack based in the former french city went on a rampage and captured four former french cities. I had just switched to FR, thus could not immediately switch to drafting (a lesson for the future - when in danger of a backstab, dont make marginal civic changes). I had to pull a bunch of units back to create a stalemate, but would need cannons to break him down. Fortunately, I had enough cavalry to finish Mao off, with the help from Nappy.
In the end, I barraged Peters stack of ~40 cavalry+rifles with ~12 cannons and took it out to finally reclaim all the northlands. 100% culture and one russian city taken, and domination was achieved, sometime in the 1600's.
Excellent game. Very demanding, but still managable with a good strategy.
azzaman333
meh
Game: BtS BOTM 27
Entry class: Contender
Game status: Conquest Loss
Game date: 620AD
Turns played: 141
Base score: 300
Final score: 279
Time played: 0:47:54
Preventing Mao's expansion meant he quickly entered WHEOOHRN, even though we were sharing religion. Unfortunately, this meant Napoleon didn't like me, and he proceeded to WHEOOHRN. At this point, I was hoping that they would be targetting each other. They weren't, they were both targetting me. I held Mao off for a good 500 years, but once Napoleon joined in, I had to defend my two best cities from two separate stacks at the same time, without catapults. I fought to the bitter end, but against stacks of 20+ units, I was dead.
Entry class: Contender
Game status: Conquest Loss
Game date: 620AD
Turns played: 141
Base score: 300
Final score: 279
Time played: 0:47:54
Preventing Mao's expansion meant he quickly entered WHEOOHRN, even though we were sharing religion. Unfortunately, this meant Napoleon didn't like me, and he proceeded to WHEOOHRN. At this point, I was hoping that they would be targetting each other. They weren't, they were both targetting me. I held Mao off for a good 500 years, but once Napoleon joined in, I had to defend my two best cities from two separate stacks at the same time, without catapults. I fought to the bitter end, but against stacks of 20+ units, I was dead.
Adventurer, Conquered by Napoleon and Mao (but mostly Napoleon) in 1730. Amazed to have actually held out that long, considering I'm still working on beating Monarch in normal games. Settled south of the Dye, second city in the deer cluster to the sw, and a string of further cities east to reach the water. Conquered Gaul on the Gems from the barbarians, too. Founded Hinduism, which Peter adopted in a big way, really helping to keep me afloat. Later, I built the Apostolic Palace, where Peter the Elector helped even more, stopping wars with Napoleon and even getting Heliopolis back for me, although not ever my original capital. Eventually giant stacks of Infantry appear and kill all of my Macemen and Crossbows...
RD-BH
Human
Lost conquest to Napoleon circa 425BC first run.
This screenie is from a subsequent attempt at a religious or cultural victory ... Peter overtook me and won.
I didn't manage to explore much before Nappy overran me on my first attempt (submitted game). This time I've seen the map ... so, me thinks I'll leave this as my best attempt and go back to regular games. 8)
This screenie is from a subsequent attempt at a religious or cultural victory ... Peter overtook me and won.
Spoiler :
I didn't manage to explore much before Nappy overran me on my first attempt (submitted game). This time I've seen the map ... so, me thinks I'll leave this as my best attempt and go back to regular games. 8)
RD-BH
Human
This is something I've always wondered about but have never measured.
Is your observation calculated or just anecdotal?
Moderator action. Moved this from the pregame thread, along with a couple of replies, since it was clearly seriously spoilerish. Even after you edited to remove civ names, you'd given clues as to the nature of one of the opponents, and the civ name had already got into one of the replies anyway. I've been nice and moved this rather than deleting it because it does give useful info, but it takes a fair bit of work to do that, so don't expect me to be so nice next time. - DS
a quick CIV4 newbie question:
How can I have the city defences of one of my walled cities reduced by an enemy from 50% to 0% with bombardment in just one turn?
How does that work?
He only had one Catapult next to the city. He also had 7 Elephants, & 7 horse archers, a couple a swordsmen next to the city. do they all get to bombard too?
And now that the defences are down from 50% to 0% does that mean the walls are effectlu non-existant? or is there another defence bonus for just being a city tile?
also how does that impact archers with the city defence bonus (50%) and city defence upgrade (20%).
Basically just wanting to know if in this kind of situation Ishould be abadoning the city before the defenders get crushed!
a quick CIV4 newbie question:
How can I have the city defences of one of my walled cities reduced by an enemy from 50% to 0% with bombardment in just one turn?
How does that work?
He only had one Catapult next to the city. He also had 7 Elephants, & 7 horse archers, a couple a swordsmen next to the city. do they all get to bombard too?
And now that the defences are down from 50% to 0% does that mean the walls are effectlu non-existant? or is there another defence bonus for just being a city tile?
also how does that impact archers with the city defence bonus (50%) and city defence upgrade (20%).
Basically just wanting to know if in this kind of situation Ishould be abadoning the city before the defenders get crushed!
Grifftavian
Emperor
Sounds like that sneaky Napoleon used a Spy on a Format City Unrest mission. That causes the city to go into revolt for one turn, and reduces the city defenses to 0% for that one turn. Very effective if you don't want to spend half a dozen turns wearing down the city walls. You need to have the spy in the enemy city, and enough Espionage Points to accomplish the mission, which you can check from the Espionage Screen.a quick CIV4 newbie question:
I just had the city defences of Elephantine (walled) reduced by Napolean from 50% to 0% with bombardment in just one turn. How does that work? He only one Catapult next to the city. He also had 7 Elephants, & horse archers, a couple a swordsmen next to the city too. do they all get to bombard too?
And now that the defences are down from 50% to 0% does that mean the walls are effectlu non-existant? or is there another defence bonus for just being a city tile?
also how does that impact archers with the city defence bonus (50%) and city defence upgrade (20%).
Basically wanting to know if these guys should be aboning the city before they get crushed!
The successful Spy mission just affects the cultural defenses. Fortified units still have their fortification bonus. And if the city is on a hill, you still have the defensive bonus for the hill terrain. But with the defenses down, the enemy Catapult can attack and cause collateral damage on most of your city defenders, softening them up for the Assault troops.
adrianj
Deity
This is a fact, and is fairly straight forward to calculate.
Cottages give raw commerce
commerce which is then divided up based on the settings of your sliders.With the culture slider pushed to 100%, cottages/hamlets/villages/towns will then give all culture, which is useless everywhere except your 3 legendary cities. (unless you're trying to culture flip a rival city near your border, or just gain land, etc, etc). You could have the slider lower than 100%, but then you aren't getting the most culture you possibly can for your legendary cities.
However, farms can be much more versatile. Extra food allows you to hire specialists, which you could assign as merchants. This directly gives you
, which can pay for your empire's expenses, allowing you to push the culture slider up higher, or just give excess gold (I spent this excess on bribing the AI into favourable religions/civics).Workshops and watermills are similarly versatile. Instead of specialists you build Wealth in the city, converting
to , and paying your expenses. This also has the extra benefit in that you won't accidentally generate a Great Merchant - something not all bad, except that with a culture game you would much prefer a Great Artist.BakeliteRules
Chieftain
- Joined
- Dec 2, 2007
- Messages
- 37
Flailed away from the Gitgo. Lost A religious defeat to Peter in 1685AD. Problems started when a miss-step from my first settler ended in a Barb lunch. I never could regain any momentum and ended with 7 cities. Peter was friendly but 3 times my score at the end. Only good thing (I think for me) was there were no wars the entire game. I did keep giving into Nappy demands and it kept him from getting angry. I mostly ignored China and he never bothered anyone. The game was fun but nerve- racking with 3 bullies so far out in front and no hope to do anything but hide or beg for mercy all game long.
mabraham
Deity
It works if the city goes into unrest - either because of culture pressure, or an espionage mission.
Certainly not.
And now that the defences are down from 50% to 0% does that mean the walls are effectlu non-existant? or is there another defence bonus for just being a city tile?
also how does that impact archers with the city defence bonus (50%) and city defence upgrade (20%).
Basically just wanting to know if in this kind of situation Ishould be abadoning the city before the defenders get crushed!
Defensive bonuses from culture and walls are independent of defensive bonuses acquired from the tile type (or any other such). For example, the City Defence upgrades work in forts as well as cities. So you keep your archer's bonuses regardless of what the city defense is doing.
Whether you should abandon is situation-dependent
RD-BH
Human
Thanks, adrianj 8)
I never thought about shoving all that culture to the other cities as waste, but it makes sense. I almost always wind up putting all the non-Legendbound cities on wealth and wondered if production (especially how nice workshops get to be in the end) wasn't outperforming the cottages. 1:1 the cottages look better than production, but I didn't think about the waste.
beestar
subdeity
Yep, definitely better. I suppose if you were running an 80% culture slider, the cottage commerce would be 80% useless culture and 20% useful gold(wealth) in those secondary cities, but without doing the math I think it's still more efficient to just make Wealth (from hammers or merchant specialists).
By the way, in your screenshot above, one thing that might be useful in the future is to squeeze in some more cities. There are lots of tiles that aren't in any city's BFC. On top of that, most cities rarely have the population to work their full 20 BFC tiles anyway, so don't be afraid to overlap BFCs.
In the screenshot, there's lots of room to settle, especially since you were going for culture and thus pushed back neighbouring borders. Squeezing in another 9 cities would dramatically increase production of science, hammers, wealth, and AP votes.
This is a lesson that I really found useful when moving up to Immortal. At this level, the AI quickly expands and doesn't leave you with much land. So it really helps to pack in the cities and make best use of what little land they leave you.
RD-BH
Human
And a lesson I use often (the beauty of +2
). I got caught up in diplomacy and forgot to push to 9 cities until very late. I usually push straight for culture victory, but in this game I decided to try religious victory.** The three extra brain cells I put to this task cut my empire management in half. **Apostolic Palace vote
Jbourne
Warlord
I like to settle my first few cities 6 tiles away from the capital toward nearest AI. I let the science rate to drop to 30% with very little concern and with a few cottages the recovery is rather rapid and also running 2 scientist in most cities allow the tech rate to not drop off. Once you get CoL and Currency. It truly is home free and you have another band of land that you can settle as the economy pick up.
Of course in this game, the direction you choose to settle determined who will hate you soonest
In a test game, done with the help of Worldbuilder, I placed 7 cities around the capital at 6-7 tiles away on turn 0. Once all were built, the maintanace jumped to 37 gpt at the end of turn 0
. Next, I gave my civ 1000 gold, pottary and BW, and played . As the cottages grew, the economy recovered and things started to look good. Also I gave some cities gold, gem or fur to see how well that effect the economy. So I know for a fact settling next to one of these tiles can basically cover the maintanance of the city. Of course this was done just to see the results of settling cities in an extream manner at Immortal level and is only possible if you have a good plan or settle cities with 2 Gems in the BFC. Thanks DS .I learned that each city need to run at least 2 cottages to turn the economy around fast or work 1 or 2 commerce resource tiles. So in these high levels, either the capital or the second city need to work some cottages as soon as possible. So by the time I am ready to expand, after growing the capital to a suitable size to work all the power tiles, that first cottages is a hamlet and on its way to become a village.
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