3-1 Deity Peaceful Photojournal

[CrazyG]

Spoiler Settings :

Settings
March 1st 2020 Patch
Standard Size Continents
Standard Speed
Deity Difficulty
Events disabled. Ancient Ruins disabled. No tech trading.
All other settings left to their default.

Spoiler Challenge Rules :

I will try to win a game peacefully without exploits. So I'm giving myself the following house rules:
⦁ No declaring war
⦁ No conquering cities. Liberating a city is okay.
⦁ On turn 80, if at peace, I'll declare war on my most threatening neighbor, to guarantee there is an early war.
The first two are to make a peaceful game. The final rule is to ban an exploit. The AI on this patch is extremely passive in the early game, and usually will not declare war until the classical or medieval era. I assume this is unintended. I could abuse it by skipping all military units for like 100 turns, but instead I'll force myself to fight an early war.

So the big problems I see is being forward settled in the early game, and not having enough power in the late game. There is a civ that addresses these two problems really well. Guess who it is?

Spoiler Starting Position :

You mistake our love of peace for weakness!

 

[crdvis16]

America is a really fun civ IMO. In previous patches I was able to get Pyramids AND Stonehenge (I assume that's probably not possible with other civs) but in this patch my guess is that's not possible anymore? In any case, the high exchange rate you get for gold -> production from buying tiles can lead to fun shenanigans with early build orders. You can choose to save gold to pop out settlers ASAP and maybe match the AIs settle rate or try to nab a bunch of early wonders, etc. The only problem is that tiles start getting pretty expensive outside of the first ring or two and the production you get starts being less impressive as it scales slower and then the fun is over.

My guess is you'll go the early wonder + Beauty route? Mining->Pyramids might make sense with your starting luxes, connect them quickly and sell for more gold to buy more tiles?

Edit: Also, playing as a civ that can reliably secure early wonders might be a big benefit in general. It seems like early wonders are often what lead to AI runaways so if you deny a few of them you might reign that in. I'm playing as Egypt in my current 3/1 patch game (but on Immortal) and I've taken roughly 1/3rd of the wonders in the game and there isn't really an AI that's runaway as a result, so if you can do something similar as America on deity you might be able keep things manageable.

 

[LifeOfBrian]

Good luck!

 

[Cokolwiek]

Can you provide a save game? I might try it, if I won't spoil myself everything by reading this first. I was a lover of old vanilla Community Deity Challange like this.
I am curious if you guys would be interested in such thing. I think it could be great fun. We don't even need specific challenges or map, we just need a common start from which we could test ourselves and discuss strategies to learn more and have better comparison and understanding in discussion.

 

[CrazyG]

Here's the turn 1 save

 

[Heinz_Guderian]

Good luck! looking forward to watching a truly great player challenge himself

Also, man I love early game in civ. Just seeing that screenshot of the first turn gets me excited. As soon as I reach industrial age I feel like just starting over. It's like the fun part of the game is mostly just setting yourself up for a great game, I am not really interested in playing it out once I have a solid first few eras.

 

[CrazyG]

So here's the first update.

Spoiler Analysis of the USA :

My goal is to get this done in one go, with no reorolling. That makes being forward settled a major problem, and only a handful of civs get a bonus that applies before the first settler. Washington is one of them, and overall I think he probably one of the best civs to use (the other top pick is India).

Let's look at the USA

• +1 sight on military units. This is a useful bonus just for scouting, but I have ruins turned off. Still useful in war but overall not that important.
  
• Half price to buy tiles. Gain 20 production when you do. This is the main reason I picked Washington, the ability to pump gold into a settler (or the Pyramids) enables me to guarantee my first expansion is in position before the AI. Overall this perk just complement's Tradition's early game quite well.
• Musketmen. For a purely peaceful game, an archer line UU is probably the best option. No strategic resource requirement, most archer units unlock on techs with key wonders, and musketmen themselves are amazing. Free accuracy means I can get +1 range or indirect fire after military acadamies. Terrain movement is great for defense, and golden age points on kills means I can get value out of defensive wars.
  
• The Smithsonian: Basically its gives me a late game culture, science, and tourism boost. I think late game muscle will be really important for this challenge.

Spoiler Where to Settle? :

The first thing I do when I see a start is plan my social policies. I'm leaning towards tradition, with progress as a second choice.
There are probably 4 reasonable ways to settle this land. The first is in place. It's a good start, and I'm considering the Pyramids so every turn counts.
The second is moving West, you can get 4 silver in the capital, but lose the copper and have less immediate food.
The third is moving towards the mountains and picking goddess of nature. I find that pantheon a little bit gimmicky though.
The fourth is moving north across the river, to get 3 silver in the capital, while keeping the copper, and fresh water. This adds empty desert though.

I settle in place because I want the silver/copper closer to me so it's cheaper to buy. I can work a marsh and a forest immediately. I build monument first, and research mining. If things look good I'll

Spoiler The Area :

4 nearby city states, giving me some free food, and then some tribute. With the gold I bought a marsh and the 3 luxury mines, but really I was buying tiles just to get the production from the unique ability. You can see that I'm blocked by mountains to the south, and can't explore the area until that barbarian camp is clear.

I went mining first, then pottery. I build a monument, then shrine. Things look smooth so I'm trying the pyramids. I've met 4 other civs, all of whom will take authority.

Spoiler New York and Pantheons :

The free settler form the pyramids settles in that desert. I counted tiles away from Rome to make sure it's impossible to put down another city between the two of us. This city builds monument, shrine, council.

My capital built 2 more workers after the Pyramids, then another settler. I'm moving towards another wave of tribute on the 4 nearby city states.

What pantheon to take? I'm the last civ to get one, and the AI has already taken Ancestor Worship, God of Commerce, God of the Expanse, God of the Open Sky, God of War, Goddess of Springtime, and Goddess of the Home.

 

[randomnub]

I was happy to sneaky play this save and didn't want to steal your playthrough but it's curious how in your game Rome was happy to rush settle north and probably piss Monty while in mine I had this nice surprise, making me think shaving some more turns thanks to early tribute (not much, but every 10 counts) was well worth it: I would have been forward settled by turn 30 if the AI committed to it and I lagged just a bit.

Spoiler :

Pantheon choice: ''my'' AIs picks look exactly the same as yours with one exception, there's somebody with God of Stars and Sky and no Goddess of Springtime. So yea I'm dead last even with a turn 4 Shrine that's what I dislike the most out of this beta.

I settled one tile east thinking I could put 6 mountains in range (crossing river and lose one turn was out of question, thanks to UA the first ring tile aren't as important imo) and make Nature a decent backup plan but the start is screaming Earth Mother and I have the chance to pick it so there we go.

I regret not having gone worker after Pyramids as you because I'll lag a bit with tile improvements and will stay at 5 pop for some time, that means less culture and faith, and the later settlers will take longer but I feared Rome could box me and wanted to claim some breathing room asap.

 

[CrazyG]

I was happy to sneaky play this save and didn't want to steal your playthrough but it's curious how in your game Rome was happy to rush settle north

You aren't stealing, I'm happy to see someone enjoying the playthrough.

Spoiler Spoiler :

I'm pretty sure that Rome was going towards that desert, but I just got there first. My target for a religion on Deity is turn 85, you will need to really pump out faith with earth mother.

 

[CrazyG]

Spoiler Hiding Game Info in Spoilers for Others :

So Goddess of Wisdom is bugged in this game, it gives 2 faith and science for having a specialist, instead of just 1 like the description says. I played for 10 turns with the pantheon before I realized. My options are to keep playing with it, or to reload the pantheon turn and play from there.

Would anyone be able to help me edit the file to change it to normal? Otherwise I'll choose another pantheon and play with it.

 

[crdvis16]

If you think you can grab another wonder soon (Maus and ToA look meh, but Petra could work in NY or Hanging Garden in Washington) then I'd go Goddess of Beauty. Grabbing Petra could really be easy since your tile buying in NY is probably still cheap and the production boost is 20 regardless.

Were you getting enough gold from tribute to justify losing out on potential quests from the CSs? Gold is super important early for America but I can't imagine your relatively small military was getting you a ton of it.

I imagine you'll aggressively sell your luxes for GPT to fund more tile buying?

Do you think there was any chance of you getting both Pyramid AND Stonehenge in this patch on deity? I've done it in past patches on deity but the AI early bonuses now might make it too risky?

 

[Stalker0]

Spoiler Hiding Game Info in Spoilers for Others :

So Goddess of Wisdom is bugged in this game, it gives 2 faith and science for having a specialist, instead of just 1 like the description says. I played for 10 turns with the pantheon before I realized. My options are to keep playing with it, or to reload the pantheon turn and play from there.

Would anyone be able to help me edit the file to change it to normal? Otherwise I'll choose another pantheon and play with it.

G confirmed the +2 faith at least was intentional, the tooltip is wrong

 

[CrazyG]

Do you think there was any chance of you getting both Pyramid AND Stonehenge in this patch on deity? I've done it in past patches on deity but the AI early bonuses now might make it too risky?

I think Stonehenge went around turn 28. I suppose if you save gold and skip building a shrine you probably could. TOA and Maus would be tough due to tech position (I researched mining first and pottery second). Hanging Gardens is definitely possible, Petra is tough to say. No one I met has desert in their capital.

The first wave of tribute doesn't really cost you any quests. The second wave could, so I didn't bother Bratislava on purpose because its a friendly cultural CS. The other three were worth around 60 gold combined, I think that's worthwhile.

 

[LifeOfBrian]

As for Goddess of wisdom, go to Pantheons.sql and change the following:

INSERT INTO Belief_CityYieldChanges
(BeliefType, YieldType, Yield)
VALUES
('BELIEF_FORMAL_LITURGY', 'YIELD_FAITH', 1),
('BELIEF_FORMAL_LITURGY', 'YIELD_SCIENCE', 1);

INSERT Into Belief_YieldChangeAnySpecialist
(BeliefType, YieldType, Yield)
VALUES
('BELIEF_FORMAL_LITURGY', 'YIELD_FAITH', 2),
('BELIEF_FORMAL_LITURGY', 'YIELD_SCIENCE', 2);

INSERT INTO Belief_GreatPersonPoints
(BeliefType, GreatPersonType, Value)
VALUES
('BELIEF_FORMAL_LITURGY', 'GREATPERSON_SCIENTIST', 2);

You can tweak the numbers here, then save, then clear the mods cache and reload the game. Should work as I've changed religous beliefs before mid-game and it worked.

 

[CrazyG]

G confirmed the +2 faith at least was intentional, the tooltip is wrong

The faith alone should be 2, or the faith and science both at 2?

 

[Stalker0]

I think Stonehenge went around turn 28. I suppose if you save gold and skip building a shrine you probably could. .

I’d say it would be a real gamble. I see those wonders taken sometimes on turn 26-27 on Immortal, so on deity it would likely be luck of the starts to get both

 

[Stalker0]

The faith alone should be 2, or the faith and science both at 2?

only got confirmation on faith, didn’t even notice the science was off as well.

 

[crdvis16]

I’d say it would be a real gamble. I see those wonders taken sometimes on turn 26-27 on Immortal, so on deity it would likely be luck of the starts to get both

Without ruins it's a bit slower so might buy you some time. I'm due for a Tradition game after my current warmonger/Assyria game is done (and I replace my dead laptop...) so maybe I'll try the dual wonder opening with America again and see if it still works.

 

[randomnub]

I think this beta is a bit too broken to be entertaining. AI aggression is way off, I've been dow-ed by shoshone and attila after I settled my 5th city when everybody was at 4, but they never committed troops. Then they accepted white peace, only to declare few turns after, fake war again. In the meanwhile, my neighbour Caesar is ammassing troops for nothing (well he's been attacked by Aztecs and Shoshone at different times, but my spotters never saw injured units.. heck Caesar is so passive he's not even finishing off injured barbarians inside his borders), and I witness Huns and Aztecs in the north with huge armies, denouncing each other, but never attacking. I manage to piss Monty by allying the same CS so he declared but he didn't show with a single soldier.

In the meanwhile, on another continent, Egypt is running away 9 techs and 2 policies above me, a bunch of wonders and a scary score but I'm catching up just fine I think.

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

 

[DeAnno]

The lack of early AI aggression maybe means this is a good opportunity to have fun with Raging Barbs, more encouragement to have military early in a natural way.