Don't forget that as Korea, when you build the GL, it gives you a research boost on top of the normal GL effects due to Korea's UA. It is like having a RA or a GS bulb upon completion for free.
G-Major LXI
- Thread starter Peets
- Start date
I decided to play another game, this time as Babylon. After a couple of false starts, I decided to play this game through to completion. I had hoped to get a salt/wheat start for massive food, but settled for this (not wanting to reroll too much).
At first glance it might not seem like much. What I like about this start is that one move to the right gives me the coveted mountainside/riverside hill tile to found Babylon. The 2 deer and 2 truffles are all camp resources and the pantheon for +1 food per camp generally does not go very quickly to the AI. More food from religion will make up for a lack of wheat and salt I hope. I get some amazing luck from ruins as I explore including 3 free tier 2 techs (Writing one turn after finishing Pottery for a very early Academy, also the Wheel and Bronzeworking came from ruins).
On turn 54, one of the AI players has beaten me to ToA (I will later discover that it was Sweden). This is much earlier than I had expected it to go. I was hoping to have ToA and Petra in my first expansion city as I had in my Korea game. Just off screen, I have settled my 3rd city.
Here is what my empire looks like on turn 100. Babylon really starts fast, rolling through technologies. I think I finished Education on about turn 85ish and as you can see I am close to Astronomy on turn 100 (having already back filled most of the Medieval era techs). Nipur (my 4th city) was founded on about turn 80, and in a few turns I will have Universities in all four cities.
Spoiler :
At first glance it might not seem like much. What I like about this start is that one move to the right gives me the coveted mountainside/riverside hill tile to found Babylon. The 2 deer and 2 truffles are all camp resources and the pantheon for +1 food per camp generally does not go very quickly to the AI. More food from religion will make up for a lack of wheat and salt I hope. I get some amazing luck from ruins as I explore including 3 free tier 2 techs (Writing one turn after finishing Pottery for a very early Academy, also the Wheel and Bronzeworking came from ruins).
Spoiler :
On turn 54, one of the AI players has beaten me to ToA (I will later discover that it was Sweden). This is much earlier than I had expected it to go. I was hoping to have ToA and Petra in my first expansion city as I had in my Korea game. Just off screen, I have settled my 3rd city.
Spoiler :
Here is what my empire looks like on turn 100. Babylon really starts fast, rolling through technologies. I think I finished Education on about turn 85ish and as you can see I am close to Astronomy on turn 100 (having already back filled most of the Medieval era techs). Nipur (my 4th city) was founded on about turn 80, and in a few turns I will have Universities in all four cities.
Which is why I hate to pass GL up as Korea! I have been generally playing it like Bleidraner has. With so many unique luxes and all the expansion spots so close, I am reluctantly passing it up on this try.
Also, you need to tech Writing early enough to get an early start. In this try, I went Pottery/Archery. I am on a gem and my other cap lux is Marble so Mining next and my region is pasture intense so I am on Animal Husbandry now as I am hoping to get the Pasture culture pantheon. I have stolen a worker from 1 AI and can get another from a CS soon, so I can get these resources up soon. Writing just took a back seat, as I didn't think I would hit GL in time anyway.
Good luck on your Babylon game-- great start -- a Writing culture ruin as Babylon is sweet!
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Yes, I think you are right. I am going to have to prioritize the coastal cities too (even over the Petra and 3 lux expo) for getting that production online and because they are furthest away and nearest the AIs. It helps that I discovered the tough choice coastal expo can actually settle ON a lux and still get that different unique lux in its 3rd ring! At least 2 coastal expos for sure.7 observatories is overkill as Korea I think.If you already have 4 good mountain cities, maybe go full coastal with other expos? The problem is that your capital isn't coastal, so you'll have to build 2 cargo ships and Colossus in those expos and that can take a pretty long time.
Now have to heed Manpanzee and carefully arrange order of planting expos.
Funny Bleidraner mentioned Mercantile CSes... the main problem with this early game is only 4 CSes even remotely close and no Mercantile ones yet. I am probably building a 4th scout next just to find the others faster while my other units (including a promoted scout) run interference for my Settlers and steal workers hopefully.
Been so busy I haven"t been able to get this one launched further yet. It is going to be a slooow early game [emoji4] Thanks to all for the advice.
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Turn 165 seems to be the benchmark to compare games on this Gauntlet. Here is what my empire looks like on turn 165. I captured Jakarta from Indonesia on about turn 120 IIRC. Jakarta is the Holy City for Hinduism which can build both Pagodas and Cathedrals with faith. I am able to capture a Hindu GP in the war as well which allows me to build Pagodas in 3 cities and Cathedrals in 2. He beat me to Stonehenge earlier in the game and also built Colossus and the close location made it a good target for a fifth city. I think there were 4 or 5 building which also survived the capture. Indonesia had lost 2 settlers to barbarians and at the time I captured Jakarta, the only other city was very far to the south leaving a nice buffer zone after the war was finished.
Notice that 3 of my cities are building World's Fair. It is set to be completed by about turn 167 so 8 turns later my GWs should have maximum potential. I have not wasted any social policies this game getting Full Tradition and 2 policies each in Commerce and Rationalism. WF should allow me to finish Rationalism by turn 185 and get Plastics. I am doing much better with gold this game as well, so I should be able to rush 1-2 Labs and quickly build another. Nippur is still playing catch up on necessary infrastructure. Jakarta is also behind my other cities, but I thought WF was more important than rounding out the buildings in Jakarta.
Here is what my tech tree looks like on turn 165. I am starting to backfill technologies to get Chemistry, Fertilizer, and Biology online by the time I burn the GWs to pop Plastics from the Rationalism finisher (circa turn 185). I am well ahead of my Korea game at this point being in a better position on techs and social policies.
Now the things which have not gone my way.
The first WC vote allowed me to get a well positioned WF, but the other thing which passed was Embargo city states. I have not made CS a priority in this game choosing to spend gold on infrastructure instead, but I have completed some CS quests and have 1-2 allies and several friends.
You can't really see it in the screenshot, but the NW corner of my empire has a Citadel which I built to grab a Truffles resource from a Hun city which was planted on my borders. Having Attila in close proximity is annoying (not really a threat because of my tech lead, but annoying all the same).
Note that all of my cities are inland (Jakarta is technically coastal, but not really). While trade caravans are nice, cargo ships are better. My answer to this was to make growth a priority in my religion. Using Hinduism temporarily to build some religious buildings before spreading my religion to all of my cities (and several CS) allowed me to have my cake and eat it too so to speak. Unfortunately, religious buildings are expensive in the Renaissance and Industrial Eras (which is the double edged sword of fast research) and buying a GP to spread my religion back to my cities cost another 500 faith. This has left me with little faith for GS in the late game and I do not have a faith producing pantheon (although I do get 50 faith every time I use a great person).
I share my end game results and some final thoughts on this game later today or perhaps tomorrow.
Spoiler :
Notice that 3 of my cities are building World's Fair. It is set to be completed by about turn 167 so 8 turns later my GWs should have maximum potential. I have not wasted any social policies this game getting Full Tradition and 2 policies each in Commerce and Rationalism. WF should allow me to finish Rationalism by turn 185 and get Plastics. I am doing much better with gold this game as well, so I should be able to rush 1-2 Labs and quickly build another. Nippur is still playing catch up on necessary infrastructure. Jakarta is also behind my other cities, but I thought WF was more important than rounding out the buildings in Jakarta.
Spoiler :
Here is what my tech tree looks like on turn 165. I am starting to backfill technologies to get Chemistry, Fertilizer, and Biology online by the time I burn the GWs to pop Plastics from the Rationalism finisher (circa turn 185). I am well ahead of my Korea game at this point being in a better position on techs and social policies.
Spoiler :
Now the things which have not gone my way.
The first WC vote allowed me to get a well positioned WF, but the other thing which passed was Embargo city states. I have not made CS a priority in this game choosing to spend gold on infrastructure instead, but I have completed some CS quests and have 1-2 allies and several friends.
You can't really see it in the screenshot, but the NW corner of my empire has a Citadel which I built to grab a Truffles resource from a Hun city which was planted on my borders. Having Attila in close proximity is annoying (not really a threat because of my tech lead, but annoying all the same).
Note that all of my cities are inland (Jakarta is technically coastal, but not really). While trade caravans are nice, cargo ships are better. My answer to this was to make growth a priority in my religion. Using Hinduism temporarily to build some religious buildings before spreading my religion to all of my cities (and several CS) allowed me to have my cake and eat it too so to speak. Unfortunately, religious buildings are expensive in the Renaissance and Industrial Eras (which is the double edged sword of fast research) and buying a GP to spread my religion back to my cities cost another 500 faith. This has left me with little faith for GS in the late game and I do not have a faith producing pantheon (although I do get 50 faith every time I use a great person).
I share my end game results and some final thoughts on this game later today or perhaps tomorrow.
In hind sight, I now remember that my Korea game had a very late Plastics. In both of these games I built Oxford to rush Radio (in an earlier post I had mistakenly said that Korea used Oxford for Plastics). Babylon was able to leverage WF to get Plastics earlier while Korea was not able to finish Rationalism until much later in the game. This forced me to research Plastics as Korea slowing down my midgame progress a tad.
Bleidraner
King
- Joined
- May 23, 2014
- Messages
- 640
@Messix. You are playing Tradition right?
Bleidraner
King
- Joined
- May 23, 2014
- Messages
- 640
Note to myself. Just crashed on 182. Replayed 1 archer move exploring, 1 CB move, going back to city, borrowed 2 rounds of 5gpt for 127, set production on a city to start WF. Saved again. @HOF staff, I will submit the crash report when I finish the game and the 2 saves, I also will attach a screenshot of the crash report from my mac.
The conclusion of my Babylon saga.
Policies have gone much better this game. In addition to finishing Rationalism during the World Fair, I have also finished all of the necessary Freedom tenets to buy SS components by turn 186.
On turn 200, I am booking along. Apollo Progrm will be completed in my capital and Hubble will be finished in my Petra city next turn.
I launch my colony ship to Alpha Centauri on turn 219. This is only 2 turns qicker than my Korea game despite the much faster start. So what happened?
Babylon does indeed start very quickly, getting lots of GS to settle Academies to beef up the research in the capital which acts as an anchor for the research having National College and an Observatory is imperitive when playing Babylon. The problem is they peter out a bit toward the end.
Notice that 3 of my cities are building research. This is because I needed to research technologies right up to the end. My 2 highest production cities were building SS components which (exactly like my Korea game) ended up being 3 purchased and 3 built. I think I popped a late GS from one of my cities to put me over the top, but overall, I had fewer GS to bulb at the end and a lower base research to boot. Part of the reason is that Korea had 7 cities (6 founded +1 conquered) vs Babylon only having 5 (4 + 1). Another contributing factor was having less faith to buy GS. I only bought 2 GS as Babylon vs 3 as Korea (+2 GE also bought with faith as Korea).
Notice also that there is no coal in my territory yet again. What are the odds of getting no coal in both of the games which I played through to the end. In this game, there wasn't even someone to conquer nearby to hook up the coal (although I think taking Berlin to get coal slowed me down more than it helped in the previous game, so I likely wouldn't have taken a 6th city just ot get coal).
All in all, it was a fun couple of games. I don't think I will have time to play another one for this Gauntlet, so congrats to the winners. Even if I could play another one, I'm not sure that I could do much better. Especially the Babylon game, the likelihood that I could get such a fast start with several lucky ruins (multiple gold, bonus population, a faith bonus and 3 key technologies!) is not very good. Perhaps a salt/wheat start might be competitive. I guess my late game needs a bit of work if I am going to close the science VC like the HOF experts.
Policies have gone much better this game. In addition to finishing Rationalism during the World Fair, I have also finished all of the necessary Freedom tenets to buy SS components by turn 186.
Spoiler :
On turn 200, I am booking along. Apollo Progrm will be completed in my capital and Hubble will be finished in my Petra city next turn.
Spoiler :
I launch my colony ship to Alpha Centauri on turn 219. This is only 2 turns qicker than my Korea game despite the much faster start. So what happened?
Spoiler :
Babylon does indeed start very quickly, getting lots of GS to settle Academies to beef up the research in the capital which acts as an anchor for the research having National College and an Observatory is imperitive when playing Babylon. The problem is they peter out a bit toward the end.
Spoiler :
Notice that 3 of my cities are building research. This is because I needed to research technologies right up to the end. My 2 highest production cities were building SS components which (exactly like my Korea game) ended up being 3 purchased and 3 built. I think I popped a late GS from one of my cities to put me over the top, but overall, I had fewer GS to bulb at the end and a lower base research to boot. Part of the reason is that Korea had 7 cities (6 founded +1 conquered) vs Babylon only having 5 (4 + 1). Another contributing factor was having less faith to buy GS. I only bought 2 GS as Babylon vs 3 as Korea (+2 GE also bought with faith as Korea).
Notice also that there is no coal in my territory yet again. What are the odds of getting no coal in both of the games which I played through to the end. In this game, there wasn't even someone to conquer nearby to hook up the coal (although I think taking Berlin to get coal slowed me down more than it helped in the previous game, so I likely wouldn't have taken a 6th city just ot get coal).
All in all, it was a fun couple of games. I don't think I will have time to play another one for this Gauntlet, so congrats to the winners. Even if I could play another one, I'm not sure that I could do much better. Especially the Babylon game, the likelihood that I could get such a fast start with several lucky ruins (multiple gold, bonus population, a faith bonus and 3 key technologies!) is not very good. Perhaps a salt/wheat start might be competitive. I guess my late game needs a bit of work if I am going to close the science VC like the HOF experts.
Bleidraner
King
- Joined
- May 23, 2014
- Messages
- 640
Well played another game, 6 cities Liberty, 2 coastal, 4 mountains. Fixed a lot of my previous mistakes, but got a 223, could not quite make up the 2 mountains less with the extra growth. Dirt was not great either. Crashed also.
Anyway, it feels to me as if I am just saving turns at this stage, instead of innovating, to get in the 210 range I need to do something different, not play the same game again. So either a new civ (but I have invested so mucb in Korea), or 7 cities. Or try a Tradition game.
I'll probably do a Tradition game, if only to benchmark vs my multiple Liberty tries. If I have time after that I will try a final Liberty game with 7 cities.
Anyway, it feels to me as if I am just saving turns at this stage, instead of innovating, to get in the 210 range I need to do something different, not play the same game again. So either a new civ (but I have invested so mucb in Korea), or 7 cities. Or try a Tradition game.
I'll probably do a Tradition game, if only to benchmark vs my multiple Liberty tries. If I have time after that I will try a final Liberty game with 7 cities.
You might try a game with 5 founded and 2 captured cities if you are going for 7. AI capitals generally have good locations and are well developed if you capture them early. If you get lucky, they will have built an early wonder or 2 for you. If you are building an army to bully CS and bust barbarian camps, may as well put it to use.
As far as Liberty vs Tradition, I like Tradition better. The free settler, worker, and great person feel like a quick way to start the game, but Tradition has long term growth. You can get a settler almost as early by building a few units and getting gold from CS, barbarians, and ancient ruins. Collective rule only saves you 500 gold (and 33% of the time to build settlers). Tradition provides 2 key buildings in 4 cities and makes building wonders faster on top of the growth benefits. It is the gift that keeps on giving.
JoeSham
Chieftain
Hi guys! Came back to Civ5 after 2 years a couple days back, bought BNW and gave this challenge a try. After some learning and reading all your tips (thx for them to all contributors in this thread), I had an ok T-243 win today only to find out that my disk was full and the last couple of autosaves were lost :/
Anyway, I botched the late-mid and end-game pretty miserably, I believe that if some of you guys took over at like T-120, it could have been a T-220 or even better game.
I played Babylon and a little different strategy than most of you described. I went tradition, one city GL->NC rush (my favorite opening from when I last used to play Civ 5), then immediate 2nd city with a bought settler. Then some bowmen and then Petra (rolled a nice Petra start). With my 4 bowmen + 1 pikeman army I started an early fight around T-70 or so and killed both my neighbours - Pacal and Maria Theresa. I puppeted 4 cities from them + razed 1. Then (and in the meantime) I also managed to ally almost all of the city states, 13 or 14 of them at one (later) point, which had a huge impact. I had absolutely crazy peak culture - after I won the World Fair, I was getting over 600 cpt and I didnt focus on culture buildings at all. My GWs then gave almost 5k culture each.
I also founded another 2 cities later in the game, around T-160 or so. Getting them up and running in time was not a problem, they had endgame population around 16-17 I think. Too bad I then completely f_cked up with GSs, Oxford and Rati finisher :/ I started Hubble way too late and then on the other hand I overbulbed by about 2 techs. Anyway, was a fun game, I might give this one last try tommorow.
Btw, not sure if it was luck or my aggressive approach, but I had a different experience than most of you guys with wonders. I was able to build pretty much all the wonders I wanted. I rushed GL, but I later also got the Oracle and HG for example and those were like around T-100 or so (after building Petra and Chicken Itza before). I believe nobody built the Pyramids at all. AI built like maybe 4 wonders in the whole game. Also, I played quite a few different starts before this game and the GL went pre T-70 only once (T-37).
(Attached a random screenshot just to show the map + starting location.)
Btw, are Great Artists needed in a science game like this one? I generated 2 with my guild, but I felt like they were kind of redundand - I already had an almost continuous late-game Golden Age from happiness + wonders.
Anyway, I botched the late-mid and end-game pretty miserably, I believe that if some of you guys took over at like T-120, it could have been a T-220 or even better game.
I played Babylon and a little different strategy than most of you described. I went tradition, one city GL->NC rush (my favorite opening from when I last used to play Civ 5), then immediate 2nd city with a bought settler. Then some bowmen and then Petra (rolled a nice Petra start). With my 4 bowmen + 1 pikeman army I started an early fight around T-70 or so and killed both my neighbours - Pacal and Maria Theresa. I puppeted 4 cities from them + razed 1. Then (and in the meantime) I also managed to ally almost all of the city states, 13 or 14 of them at one (later) point, which had a huge impact. I had absolutely crazy peak culture - after I won the World Fair, I was getting over 600 cpt and I didnt focus on culture buildings at all. My GWs then gave almost 5k culture each.
I also founded another 2 cities later in the game, around T-160 or so. Getting them up and running in time was not a problem, they had endgame population around 16-17 I think. Too bad I then completely f_cked up with GSs, Oxford and Rati finisher :/ I started Hubble way too late and then on the other hand I overbulbed by about 2 techs. Anyway, was a fun game, I might give this one last try tommorow.
Btw, not sure if it was luck or my aggressive approach, but I had a different experience than most of you guys with wonders. I was able to build pretty much all the wonders I wanted. I rushed GL, but I later also got the Oracle and HG for example and those were like around T-100 or so (after building Petra and Chicken Itza before). I believe nobody built the Pyramids at all. AI built like maybe 4 wonders in the whole game. Also, I played quite a few different starts before this game and the GL went pre T-70 only once (T-37).
(Attached a random screenshot just to show the map + starting location.)
Btw, are Great Artists needed in a science game like this one? I generated 2 with my guild, but I felt like they were kind of redundand - I already had an almost continuous late-game Golden Age from happiness + wonders.
Attachments
Welcome back to Civ 5! Great game coming back!
I bow down before your cultural awesomeness. That is fantastic.
Yes, they were fine for a win at T243, but if you are looking to win earlier that is pretty late to be founding cities. The science penalty per city stinks big time late. I would guess they at best didn't hurt your finish time and at worst slowed it down a bit. Though if you went Freedom and got those specialist buildings up real fast, who knows?- it might have helped a bit.
Generally they will remove the "almost" from "almost continuous" if you play them right [emoji4]
Thanks for the great writeup. Very nice game after a long layoff!
--
I may not get an entry in on this one until after the deadline. My 2 month old laptop has been in the HP service center for a week "waiting on a part." Tomorrow is a holiday here so it will be awhile before my main gaming time is returned to me.
The start I posted on previously sat on my PC a full day. I went back to it and played a few turns on it but the fans were grinding and the case was hot, so I shelved the game and have gone for new fans before getting more civ in.
Good luck to all looking to get a good late game in.
@Mesix - btw, congrats on the great games you have been getting in. Sound like fun. Appreciate the writeups as they are interesting and helpful.
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Bleidraner
King
- Joined
- May 23, 2014
- Messages
- 640
Well I will not be able to submit another game either, so this is it for me too. Great gauntlet, loads of fun!
EDIT: By the way, I finally figured out the late game acceleration vs. Messix. It really has to do with the timings of the buildings, I was about to finish 5 of my 6 schools, which is the equivalent of 5 RAs happening just after teching steel. That means that my Ideology to Plastics run was really fast, I was not behind 20 turns vs. Messix, more like 10. The advantage in infrastructure explains the other 10 turns.
EDIT: By the way, I finally figured out the late game acceleration vs. Messix. It really has to do with the timings of the buildings, I was about to finish 5 of my 6 schools, which is the equivalent of 5 RAs happening just after teching steel. That means that my Ideology to Plastics run was really fast, I was not behind 20 turns vs. Messix, more like 10. The advantage in infrastructure explains the other 10 turns.
Speaking of Great Artists, I've been thinking that it might be a good plan to research Guilds before going for Astronomy. The idea is to generate an Artist by the time observatories become available, pop a Golden Age to increase your culture (faster Rati policies), production (faster observatories) and gold which you should be saving up for schools at that point.
Gauntlet Results:
G-Major LXI - Science, King, Standard, Frontier, Standard, Any Leader
1st Manpanzee - 1460 AD T-206
2nd vadalaz - 1520 AD T-214
3rd Mesix - 1545 AD T-219
Congratulations!
G-Major LXI - Science, King, Standard, Frontier, Standard, Any Leader
1st Manpanzee - 1460 AD T-206 2nd vadalaz - 1520 AD T-214 3rd Mesix - 1545 AD T-219 Congratulations!
Bleidraner
King
- Joined
- May 23, 2014
- Messages
- 640
Well done to all. It was a challenging map and Manpanzee's result was fantastic. Fantastic games also from Vadalaz and Messix.
