TSG56 After Action thread

[pkf]

I think a well played finish could shave the time to late 220s but no more.

Considering it took me 13 turns to build UN because of no GE (missed pisa by 2 turns, missed taj by 1, so no free GE or culture for order) you might be about right, although Arilian seemed to have a much better game going if not for the wrong VC

I'd say a really well played game might even come close to 200, but it's very much dependent on luck: key wonders, key techs (they could steal) and most importantly, your cultural CS surviving..

 

[glory7]

Heard this challenge is hard even for diety players? Worth playing?

Also, I see that everybody did a diplomatic victory with the computer being far ahead in score etc, is that really a pleasent way to win? No critic, just wondering.

hm this is totally different type of game, I would say. You can conquer the world if you want it, but it would delay the designated victory (this time diplomacy) time so you need to balance. I chose to conquer my 2 neighbors while teching, but it shows that my approach was bascially same (maxym's game) or even slower (pkf and Arillian's game).

If you want to expand your game style and try new things, this could be a good experience. Before playing gotm series, all I could do was CB - Xbows - cavarly + artil but that was more than enough to win most games at deity. But playing those domination types is different from getting faster victory in other victory conditions and I learned a lot from past gotms.

 

[glory7]

@glory: how did you go about the warring? usual CB rush? how late and in what order? Cathy first then will i assume?

not sure about the exact time, but I think it was around t80 when I settled my 2nd city. There's a river coast position north of russia cap where you have desert areas with 2 river wheat and 2 whales. I wanted that spot and my settler was on the way, but cathy's settler was going there too. I needed extra worker(s) and I didn't want to her to plant city there first, so I DoWed (and I knew that if I let her do w/e she wants to do it could be a problem later as it is likely that she will grow really big).

At that DoW time, I had like 3 trieme and one warrior (given at the beginning of the game) and one scout (that stole settlers and workers). After DoW, I built 5-6 archers and upgraded them to CBs later. She built the city where I wanted to eventually, so I sent my settler to the west coast of my starting lsland and plantted 3rd there. It delayed my 3rd city timing by at least 10 turns...

after taking that coastal city, I got a nice peace deal - I had 4 CBs at that moment. After 10 turns, I attacked and took one more and went for russia cap. I thought I could get it with citadel and 6 CBs, but failed as William DoWed me. so I got peace deal from russia and killed Dutch army, and went for russia cap later. After taking the cap (t166), I went for william but it was too late (better than not going though) - got dutch cap with many wonders at t186.

I think I should have killed russia by t130-140 and dutch by t150-160 to compensate opportunity cost of missing wonders (oracle, HS, etc) and missing RAs (I had only one RA with america in my game - america killed china and took greece cap when I met them). If I could have 3-4 RAs, I think I might have finished around t235, but well, then I could not have two nice caps for my 4th and 5th cities, so who knows.

 

[Maxym]

How high did your beakers get to? I was in mid 700s when bulbing most of my GSs, got to just over 800 later. But that's with only one lab, and few irrelevant puppets, I was hurting for culture so I could not afford annexing anything. In both cases I got order within one turn of getting globalization, so a close shave, and I would have struggled if my teching was faster. I guess you don't need it right then, since without overflow UN still needs few turns of hard building so order can wait.

I think getting Taj would have helped a lot, and as pkf says having cultural CS would help. I had only one, and two mostly at war with me, and when I was at peace with Will I knew I would want my gpt back some day so I never put money into them.

Just wondering if even more peaceful approach, with 3 in patronage would not have been better. This way CS would power cap growth and SP acquisition and meeting everyone few turns later would be compensated for by faster adoption of rationalism policies.

I got a lot of RA out of the other continent, two or three each with US, Alex and Siam, one with Will and only one with Cathy was broken.

My other problem was that both Cathy and Will founded and enhanced before me leaving me very crappy belief choices and nowhere to spread mine.

I found UA very useful as it was almost counteracting Cathy's defender of faith and Himeji

 

[pkf]

I'd say about 800bpt should the do the trick, since as soon as you get labs everywhere, you just wait 8 turns and bulb. no point in peaking further i guess.

 

[Attaturk]

Capital west of the mountain. Steele - Granary - (pop4) GL - (pop 5) NC - workboat - (pop 6 from hut) workboat - trireme - workboat - settler - settler
city 2 west of capital, on the coast east of sheep hill
city 3 south of capital near the mountain on my side of the mountain range

Tradition - 1 pat - 5 rat - +1 pat

Wonders: GL-HS-Pisa (ENG)-PT-Taj-Eifel tower

667bpt when I started burning GS. First two GS were settled.

peaceful game apart from Cathy declaring 5 turns before I won

2 RAs with Cathy and Washington
1 broke RA with Alex (got destroyed)
1 RA with Siam

Military was two caravels + initial warrior

Cathy became my friend about turn 90 and stayed nearly until the end.

All the spies were on CS duty.

 

[glory7]

Capital west of the mountain. Steele - Granary - (pop4) GL - (pop 5) NC - workboat - (pop 6 from hut) workboat - trireme - workboat - settler - settler
city 2 west of capital, on the coast east of sheep hill
city 3 south of capital near the mountain on my side of the mountain range

Tradition - 1 pat - 5 rat - +1 pat

Wonders: GL-HS-Pisa (ENG)-PT-Taj-Eifel tower

667bpt when I started burning GS. First two GS were settled.

peaceful game apart from Cathy declaring 5 turns before I won

2 RAs with Cathy and Washington
1 broke RA with Alex (got destroyed)
1 RA with Siam

Military was two caravels + initial warrior

Cathy became my friend about turn 90 and stayed nearly until the end.

All the spies were on CS duty.

nicely done. impressive that you got GL... in my game I think it was gone before t40.

 

[glory7]

How high did your beakers get to? I was in mid 700s when bulbing most of my GSs, got to just over 800 later. But that's with only one lab, and few irrelevant puppets, I was hurting for culture so I could not afford annexing anything. In both cases I got order within one turn of getting globalization, so a close shave, and I would have struggled if my teching was faster. I guess you don't need it right then, since without overflow UN still needs few turns of hard building so order can wait.

I think getting Taj would have helped a lot, and as pkf says having cultural CS would help. I had only one, and two mostly at war with me, and when I was at peace with Will I knew I would want my gpt back some day so I never put money into them.

Just wondering if even more peaceful approach, with 3 in patronage would not have been better. This way CS would power cap growth and SP acquisition and meeting everyone few turns later would be compensated for by faster adoption of rationalism policies.

I got a lot of RA out of the other continent, two or three each with US, Alex and Siam, one with Will and only one with Cathy was broken.

My other problem was that both Cathy and Will founded and enhanced before me leaving me very crappy belief choices and nowhere to spread mine.

I found UA very useful as it was almost counteracting Cathy's defender of faith and Himeji

haven't checked, but it was over 1000 at peak, but it was not really important I think. for SV, it takes longer but for DV, as pfk said after plastics it's pretty quick to reach globalization.

my plastics timing was too late compared with other peaceful approaches. and for immortal level, I think RAs are worth doing it, especially when other guys are bigger than you. Lesson learned.

 

[Attaturk]

nicely done. impressive that you got GL... in my game I think it was gone before t40.

There was a plenty of production 2 sheep + 4 food tile I got Gl at t37.

 

[glory7]

There was a plenty of production 2 sheep + 4 food tile I got Gl at t37.

hm, I guess you went writing beeline. I beelined to optics and I think right before I got optics GL was gone, so it was around t35 I think. What was your plan if AI gets GL first? I fear that possibility and don't try GL at immortal (definitely not in deity level)

 

[tomoliop]

Ugh, around 250 I gave up. I have been in a state of perpetual war with Catherine, since before T100... I killed one of her cities, early on, but she still wouldn't make peace... All the time she wanted one or two of my 3 cities... If I had made a decisive push before T200 I probably could've beaten her, but I didn't... This map was a pain... Guess I'm going back to Emperor...

 

[Tesuji]

One last play through today, got a 240 turn diplomatic victory. This can be shaved off a little but not by much, I ended up with more research than I needed, but I'm not sure what I could have done differently instead of research to save time. In the end I was still able to get a win on the first vote.

This is a great guide to learn. I tried a few times before I got the hang how it should be played. I found out there are a lot of details up to chance that can affect the outcome considerably (like the AI snatching Gods of the Sea, lol). I never got AH from ruins for example, so initially I was always 4 turns behind. But I also found a few small ways to improve to catch up. I managed to keep up to the schedule outlined until about turn 170. But I then failed to sign any RAs. Only with Washington much later, and only two with William, also much later. None with the others. I ended up finishing in 260 turns. I think I could have saved a good number of turns, maybe 10, if I had built a little more culture production to finish rationality earlier. But without the RAs I don't see how to get faster.

So the main question left unanswered to me is: is there a way to increase the chance of getting friendship signed with an AI? I feel asking myself actually hurts my chances and I'm better off waiting for the AI to take the initiative. But I'm not sure, I could just be imagining things. it's annoying the way the AI always seems to refuse an I know of no way to improve on it.

 

[Maxym]

Give them 5 gpt, if it looks like they might need just a bit of a push to go from friendly to DOf. It adds a we traded recently modifier +2 ( highlighted green) if they denounced someone you have bad relations with anyway, denounce them too, especially if more than one civ hates them. Also work on the easiest civ first, sometime they will have friends and once you DOF them, cascade of DoFs will follow.

 

[Attaturk]

hm, I guess you went writing beeline. I beelined to optics and I think right before I got optics GL was gone, so it was around t35 I think. What was your plan if AI gets GL first? I fear that possibility and don't try GL at immortal (definitely not in deity level)

If I can quickly expand to 4 cities, I ignore GL, if there is no place for 4 good cities and I can get a GL before turn 38, I usually go for it. In most of my games T38 is the magic turn when GL is gone at high levels. They may get it earlier if they are lucky with huts, but usually it is T38.

 

[Neuro]

I'm curious to see Tommy's report. I'm guessing he turns in a 235 game, and I'm guessing he posts it on the 29th of May =)

 

[Arnold_T]

misplayed the start of this game by prioritizing Writing instead of getting out onto the water. was thinking about going for Great Library but realized that I wasn't going to get it before turn 40, so skipped it. A little later I starting working the free Ampitheatre in the cap, but then forgot about it and before I knew it my first Great Person pops out, a GA! shoot, never made that mistake before
It slowed my science a lot not having the acadamy, but I setted him and worked the tile for the culture which was not so bad.
This map really seemed to cramp my style. I decided to go peaceful for a change, expand a bit to five cities, but not aggresively into Dutch and Russian space. Managed to sign and complete two RAs with Russia, two more with the Dutch, and also two with Greece, but the second one with Greece didn't complete because he got crushed by Japan. had tons of cash by the end though, and got all the surviving city states to vote for me as well as Russia, Dutch, and America. Only Japan didn't vote me, probably because I took all his gold and declared on him about 20 turns before the vote.
Interesting game Leif, thanks!
Arnold_T

 

[gkreitz]

Game:	Civ5 GOTM 56
Date submitted:	2013-03-31
Reference number:	28619
Your name:	gkreitz
Game status:	Diplomacy Victory
Game date:	1850AD
Turns played:	[B]295[/B]
Base score:	1205
Final score:	2042

Played this one pretty poorly in the beginning, and the map wasn't exactly forgiving towards that. Got an early DoW from the combined forces of William and Catherine, and missed out on a couple of early wonders with a few turns. Eventually peaced out Catherine (after freeing Colombo which she had taken) and took a large fraction of William's lands.

Catherine ended up being a bit of a science runaway, had a second very long war with her where she had a clear military tech lead. Happily I had a decent fleet and managed to capture a city with most of her airforce (11 planes!) which removed most of her ability to strike back. Washington captured most of the other continent. He backstabbed me 3 turns before the vote (sigh, I was just about to do that to him...), but happily only had 2 city states. He had ~700 gpt so I quickly allied all remaining city states preventing him from using all that gold.

Thanks for the challenging immortal map!

 

[bc1]

I'm curious to see Tommy's report. I'm guessing he turns in a 235 game, and I'm guessing he posts it on the 29th of May =)

he has'nt posted yet... but it's possible to finish by T215, since I could have finished a good dozen turns earlier (I wasted a faith GS bulb, and I should have signed a last round of subsidized RAs with Alex & George - I had the cash)

- How many cities did you build and how many did you decide to acquire?
Built 4 cities (tradition start) + puppet Amsterdam (stuffed with wonders)

- How did you use religion or spying to your advantage?
Used religion to get the great library on t35 (+15% for early wonders), increase production (+15%), raise cash (+100 per convert city), snowball faith (+2 per wonder, religious texts) to purchase GS (which I completely messed up).
Used spies only to rig city state elections.

- How did diplomacy go with your neighbors?
Got dowed by Holland after founding a second city on "his" continent (as expected), friends with mostly everyone else (after I took Amsterdam with XB, Kathy beat up Holland, after she finished I was expecting her to dow me and had to waste cash on units, but she did not)

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
Decided to go all out for the great library (pantheon & social policy choices), which I would not have on deity

- Were your UA and UU helpful?
UA = no, since Holland and I were the same size
UU = did not even build one
Edit: however UB was very useful (1st religion)

What worked are the same old recipes: 4-city tradition, strong focus on science, sign as many RA's as possible with PT and rationalism bonus (although could have done 2 more), and take every possible from the AI (trading away luxuries and all strategics). Of course to help flip the city states at the end of the game, got the first three patronage policies. Abuse archer/CB/XB and rely on inept AI warfare

Reference number: 28627
Your name: bc1
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1585AD
Turns played: 227
Base score: 1182
Final score: 2626
Time played: 9:36:00

 

[Maxym]

Interesting religion choices, very counterintuitive, and ballsy play (GL, settling on William) seems like they paid off handsomely, GG bc1. Care to post some SS so we can see what it looked like?

 

[bc1]

T20: all alone on a stupid strip of land... impossible to steal workers, ransom AI etc... it's going to be a slow start. Decide to go tall and focus on wonders. Notice I purchased some plots with the 60$ from the south ruin

Spoiler :

T35: great library: notice how I starved the city a bit to save one build turn... even with +15% religion & +15% ancient wonder policy, minimize risk

Spoiler :

T106: education, with cash to buy university

Spoiler :

T127: war! Only the AI can loose with such odds... Edit: a key fact is that Willie built his knights with my horsies... So his main assets are operating at 50%, the archers are not much of a threat and pikes don't like bows

Spoiler :

T158: Amsterdam taken on previous turn, and peace signed. It's full of wonders but lost most buildings

Spoiler :

T163: scientific theory, with cash for schools

Spoiler :

T193: plastics, with cash for labs

Spoiler :