6otM157 AAR

[Eyswein]

Welcome to the 6otM157 After Actions Report thread. In this thread you can post the results of your game. Please state victory date and score (preferably in the post title), as recorded in the Hall of Fame, and the most important: your path to glory!

STOP - Please do not continue reading this thread until you have completed and submitted your game.

Please attach your victory save to your post.

- What was your plan for achieving the VC? What are the major steps you planned to take? What events, if any, changed the plan in execution and to what new plan? Any interesting decision points?
- What were your initial 5-10 builds in the capital or other early cities?
- Early order for technology/civics? What did you prioritize for technology/civics?
- How did the leader bonus and civ unique ability impact your plan/play, if at all?
- How many cities did you settle and/or capture? Where did you settle your first few cities?
- What were key production/purchase focuses? Military units / Civilian units / Districts & city development / Wonders / Civ Unique Unit & Infrastructure? Most critical or interesting?
- Pantheon chosen and why? Religious beliefs chosen, and why?
- What governments did you select? What key policy cards did you use? Why?
- Which Governors were most important; when and why?
- Was diplomacy/trading useful? How? Relations with other civs?
- When did you have Dark/Golden ages?
- How did the game modes affect or impact your play?
- Any surprises/frustration/elations you ran into, how did you deal with it?
- Did you enjoy your game?

Please use spoiler tags for any surprise details you'd like kept hidden. Thanks.

 

[Eyswein]

Received a report that dams do not work on this map. May be a bug for the East Asia map.

 

[ummd]

Received a report that dams do not work on this map. May be a bug for the East Asia map.

confirmed

 

[kwin]

Science Victory, T171 Score 1577

Plan
I did not know the leader (never played), but I did played china a bit therefore for a science victory I focus on eureka, this time I decided to grab as many land as I can because from previous gotm AAR I found this is where I need to improve...
Because of the Start location and the amount of floodplain and marsh I decided that my top priority was to rush Etemenanki wonder... Then because of China special eureka on wonders I had in mind to go for as many wonders as possible as quickly as possible; so to get a good balance on conquering neighbor, building wonders I decided to focus on 3-4 good cities first and then develop my empire

Early game
Etemenanki was my first priority I explored my river first to get the best location for it..First I decided to not rush for an early war with Qin but whenever I see an opportunity for a quick victory I will go for it...
Decided my B2 will be south east from me, because it will be my stronger early B2 before I got any bonuses (2-2 title + 2x sugar)
I decided the best location for Etemenanki will be my B3 south west from my capital.
I settled my B4 coastal on south with very good early bonuses (Etemenanki + pantheon)
By turn 85 I only got 4 cities

Conquest
I first conquered Qin (T82-105)
waiting for caravel (noticed very early his capital was coastal but he built wall very early... too early for a galley rush) + 2 catapult/2 horses/3 archers ... I had no iron in the early game so horses was the only strategic resource available. (which actual was decisive for the end game)

Then I went for Vietnam with 1 fregate 3 coursers, supported by my trebuchet/crossbow (T110-120)

Then I came for Samarkand which opened to mongol land : serious business started here as I took an emergency to save Indonesia ( totally killed by Mongol T115)
right after Samarkand complete pillage I upgraded my level 2 coursers as cavalry and I founded my economy based on full pillage of Mongolia (built a couple more of coursers/cavalry) then capturing his best cities
Regarding the others ones : I revived Indonesia for nice favor boost + had no interest in the city...
I kept 3 strong cities (with nice chops available for space project in the end game), let 1 city turned as a free city and razed the last 2 ones in the end as he declined any peace treaty with me

Finally I stop conquered any cities, as I was letting other AI's survived... However my lvl2/3 cavalry get upgraded to Helicopter T150 and unfortunately for them all other's AI decided to go in emergency against me as I conquered Mongol capital at the same time...
Therefore just by T175 all district/mines/improvement in the map get pillaged. In the end game my income reached 3000-5000 gold per turn and 1000-2000 faith per turn
I had a lot of fun doing this... I also managed to time a x6-7 campus pillage in a single turn with wonder scientist to one turn the last science as I was stacking prod/prepare chop in all my cities to start mass space project in all my space port to save 1 turn

Note sure if my decision to stop conquering city was a good one, but at this stage I decided to focus on +3/5 amenities bonus to boost their production outcome, having more cities would have boost my science eventually by a bit but would have cost me some turn lost in completing some space project

Spoiler AI saccage final state :

Cities
21 cities, settled 6 only, all others were conquered.

I had in mind to focus on few cities first to rush wonder + Qin box me very early in my expansion; therefore Ancestral Hall was not an option for me in this game (even if I value this one a lot)
I decided to go with Audience Chamber as I wanted to focus on leader bonus to rush city with 10 pop (for science and culture bonus) and also I always value a lot amenities so Audience helped me a lot to get a reliable +3/+5 bonus asap
but I believe Throne is a strong alternative having +20% prod bonus from turn 80 to the end in my game would have been fantastic too... I am wondering what would have been my game here... on the other hand I would have loose a lot of turn and energy to rush for 10 pop cities in my early game...
This 10pop bonus was a turning point to get science lead early over the AI's... Actually I did some food project on my cities to either get to a new district cap (mostly on my conquered ones) but I did it in the one I founded to go from 8-9 to 10 pop (especially with the one I founded because they had a lot of production)

Qin cities were actually quite bad: they only purposed was to get to 10 pop more or less...
Vietnam cities were quite good
Mongol cities help me to get 2 spot for buying/chopping space project (with moksha4/magnus )

Spoiler City production recap :

Governors
I opened Pingala first for science/culture boost in my capital (also for the space project boost as I identified early my cap as best production outcome thanks to a nice industrial zone + ruhr potential with all those nice hill).
Note I realized I did not faced the bug with dam as the only one I planned get denied by salpeter in my capital...

then I went for Magnus 2 (to boost growth in my B2 combined with sugar corporation) and to set internal road to my b2 (+4/5 food +2/3prod was a nice boost to all other cities)

other governor were used for the Audience boost, I also used Victor to rotate in some cities to get housing bonuses and help them to rush to 10pop

I set a moksha 4 followed by magnus in the end game to buy/rush last space project in one of the mongol city I conquered (this city was founded by Indonesia initially)

Diplomacy
None: war, war, war!!!
get few luxury ressource deals not sell any favor nor strategic resources (I missed a lot of strategic in the early)

Technology and Civics
I tried to get as many Eureka as possible supported by 2 free inquiry area
initially rushed first empire (hard tech foreign trade) then classic republic then recorded history (campus boost) then feudalism
Regarding tech: pottery, writing (Etemenanky rush+ 3x campus opening), irrigation (to work my luxury), Currency(corporation boost/internal road), masonry (pyramid), Apprenticeship, Cartography, Industrialization was my priority order

Religion
Pantheon Lady of the Reeds and Marshes: as a BBG player I initially planned for the broken pantheon giving a free settler but I noticed +2 prod on all those tiles was too good to pass on (from +1 prod in BBG)
Religion none... I was thinking about a late religion to use my faith to buy campus building and/or extra amenities when I noticed Stonehenge was still opened... but when I decided to go with stonehenge last religion get completed the next turn... it was a bit annoying to get this tile occupy by my unfinished stonehenge for the rest of the game in my b3 (spent 1 turn in it and unfortunately this is the first game were AI did not built Stonehenge at all, so I had to live with this unfinished job)


Wonders
Etemenanki in my B3 T63 was the turning point to sky rocket in yields/science: the main focus since turn1
I also completed pyramid T62 in my capital (despite launching it much later)
Artemis in my B2 T67 (found a great place to do it thank to Samarkand camp next to me... I did not really planned to do it but I decided to go all-in with it when I see this opportunity because it was a very nice synergy with Magnus 2 in my B2)
Hanging Garden T91 (B1) nice synergy with leader bonus
Coliseum T128 (B4) loving this wonder a very nice spot for it in my B4
Kilwa T129 (B3) and Halicarnass T134 (B4) were in my to do list for science victory
Forbiden City T134 (B2) thank to great engineer nice to have, found a good opportunity not really planned for it
Rurh valley T136 (B1) love this one whenever I can go for it!
Casa de Contratacion T154 (B1) thanks to engineer between space project turn... I did it because of a mistake on governor title calculation (for my late plan on moshka 4... actually I did not needed to do this wonder at all, but it was close and much convenient with this one)

Note I got an early relic in a hut, and because of wonder spam + high pop in my cities I realized I almost win a cultural victory around T100, when I noticed I immediately gave it to the second in tourism to avoid a cutural victory was in 16/26 from 0/24 in a couple of turns (I remember someone lose previous gotm because of this so I checked luckily from time to time)

Leader and Civ bonuses
Free inquiry for the first 2 golden age + Civ bonuses = High focus on Eureka all along the game (wonders spam helped me a bit)

I did some food project to get 10 pop cap on 8-9 pop cities to rush the last turns to get the bonus, I set a magnus 2 to set internal road to my B2 to focus on my cities growth
whenever a cities got 10 pop I used victor to rotate between my cities thanks to Audience Chamber, my commercial road was mainly used to boost B1-B3-B4 production to B2 the remaining one to boost other cities growth (did a bit of trader rotation for the other ones)

City States
Used my first trader to Muscat to complete my first quest and secure early suz (my first cities got all commercial hub + secure a golden age)
Zanzibar was also in my back pocket, same as Buenos aires (but this one get destroyed early by barbarians quite early)
I also secured Hong Kong early for my late game (not sure if it boost food project?)
I discovered science CS very late in my game I sent Amani Secured one the other one were too far away to get discovered/contest by AIs
I also secured all the production CS by the end game

Kilwa + Globalization card were decisive for my late game science boost

note: I suzed Vatican T169 did not used this one at all... I thought about conquering this one but did never bother actually

Barbarians
No problem with them, I discovered barbarian clan mode in this game, wondering if everyone get the same CS created along the game? maybe a game with more than 3 blue CS would have helped a lot
Also I did not played with it on purpose... when I had a camp next to me I destroyed it, not sure how to use this game mode efficiently

Corporation game mode
First time playing this mode... I only planned to use sugar corporation to help city growth in my B2 one of the main reason for my B2 placment
cotton in my cap to boost my yield/production in my cap for the late game, bonus on unit was almost useless except for 2/3 horse/courser I casually 1-2 turns them to lunch my wars... Maybe I under estimate a bit how useful it was to boost catapult x2 I built in the early (as there is no policy card to boost siege unit in vanilla game) so cotton corporation boost was the only one available to build my initial army

latter I used another one to boost my science in my B6 (and last city I found in upper left corner mainly to benefit from this corporation... not sure how it boost my overall science

I did used some great trader to improve in monopoly whenever it was feasible to improve yield in my cities

did not used products at any point... not sure how to use it efficiently...

Build Order (opening BO)

B1: Slinger - Settler - Builder - Settler - Monument - trader - Campus - Settler - Gov Plazza (discount) - Builder - Pyramid
B2: Monument - Campus - Slinger - Commercial hub (discount) - Builder - Artemis
B3: Campus - Etemenanki - Commercial hub (discount)
B4: Galley (for golden age) - Galley (to look for an early rush/pre-build)

Final state
I had a lot of fun with the map, I personally did not experienced any bug with dam as I did not used any.... I initially planned one for my cap, but it was denied by Saltpeter (I needed to discover this resources for frigate support)
I usually stop on 8-12/13 cities in case I don't go for domination victory... but thanks to gotm I tried to get more land so ending with 21 cities which is like a new record to me in science victory...
I also gain few turns on my previous gotm going for science victory from 175 with Mathias to 171 with this one... with a complete different approach so I really enjoyed this game!

Usually playing BBG space race seems wonky a bit in vanilla rule set (especially the builder boost)... I launch last project T161 first boost from T164 and completed T171 whereas I was traveling at 28years speed per turn in the end... I suspect there was some bug or some mechanic I don't know with power shortage and space project... because I got some red electricity flag close to city name from time to time despite not having any notification like an usual electricity shortage... which was very weird to me because I had enough coal/resources (180+) to feed all my power plants by a large margin...

Spoiler science victory screen :

Closing words
special thanks to @Rutseg for the AAR formating I had great time reading his last AAR so I used his formatting to do my recap

 

[hankhill]

Science victory turn 179/180
- What was your plan for achieving the VC? What are the major steps you planned to take? What events, if any, changed the plan in execution and to what new plan? Any interesting decision points?
My early game plan was to settle the starting area, get the marsh/desert floodplains pantheon and build Etemenanki to boost early yields. After that focus on getting more cities and grow them to pop 10 asap, by using Audience Chamber and lots of governors. Qin denounced me for clearing a barbarian camp near it's borders (I never seen an AI dislike you for clearing a camp) and marching some troops towards me. I was just building Etemenanki when he declared war and had very little army, luckily I could sell some luxury and buy a man at arms (around T35 ) from a barbarian camp and crush poor Qins units. Meanwhile my scout discovered a wandering indonesian settler and spotted an almost finished Etemenanki in it's borders, so I had to declare and park my scout on the almost finished wonder. Decided to keep pushing with my army on Qin, but this all delayed settling the starting area, I finally settled two more cities around T75 (one using the indonesian settler).

Spoiler :

- What were your initial 5-10 builds in the capital or other early cities?
Beijing: scout, builder and settler, Etemenanki, holy site, Hanging gardens, Pyramids, another builder and warrior in between there as well.
Shenyang: builder, granary and two slingers

- Early order for technology/civics? What did you prioritize for technology/civics?
Civics: getting to political philosophy to build Audience chamber
Techs: getting plantations fast and finishing whatever tech I got the boost for. Later focussing on techs improving housing like Engeneering and Celestatial navigation

- How did the leader bonus and civ unique ability impact your plan/play, if at all?
Getting cities to pop 10 had major impact, I was getting denounced by everyone after taking over Qin, and had negative gold per turn with no options for trade. Then I wonder why I suddenly getting 20 gold per turn, realizing my first city hit pop 10
I kinda forgot about the food project, even though i did ran the faith one early on. Could have used it to grow some cities a bit earlier maybe.

- How many cities did you settle and/or capture? Where did you settle your first few cities?
Settled two more cities at T75 after Beijing and Shenyang, later two more cities in the north and finally two more captured settlers build some island cities. Took over China (Qin), Vietnam, Indonesia, Mongolia (Genghis) and one city from Scythia

Spoiler :

- What were key production/purchase focuses? Military units / Civilian units / Districts & city development / Wonders / Civ Unique Unit & Infrastructure? Most critical or interesting?
Getting man at arms from barbarian camp early made conquering so easy. I ended up buying 4 from that camp and conquering 4 civs with them. Kilwa was really good with all those city states.

- Pantheon chosen and why? Religious beliefs chosen, and why?

Spoiler :

I never picked Cross-Cultural Dialoque before, but I thought I give it a try to max science. I ended up getting around 90 per turn from it at the very end of the game. I think I build one stupa. So overall I dont think it was worth going for religion or at least not the benfits I picked. Vatican city was great for spreading to the newly conquered lands using great people.

- What governments did you select? What key policy cards did you use? Why?
Classical Republic first to get the legacy and great person boost, then Oligarchy for the war efforts. Monarchy into Theocracy for the faith discount. Finally communism for science boost, 5 turns of democracy to spend Big ben money and finally Synthetic technocracy for project boosts. I had low amenities all game, so anything to boost amenity was helpful.

- Which Governors were most important; when and why?
None in particular, just needed to recruit them to boost any city with Audience Chamber. As soon as a city hit pop 10 I would move them to the next. Had Pingala in the cap most of the game. Got both Reyna and Moksha rushing spaceports in the end game.

- Was diplomacy/trading useful? How? Relations with other civs?
I had a friendship with Kublai Khan early and was selling a lot of sugar and cotton to everyone. I ended up taking Qins final city on the same turn the friendship expired, guess I should have renewed it before taking the city, oops. Everyone denounced me on the next turn and I was left with no trading partners.

- When did you have Dark/Golden ages?
All golden monumentality. I was buying builders with faith to rush space projects, which was a first for me.

- How did the game modes affect or impact your play?
Apart form the 4 man at arms, i didn't interact with barbarians, only destroying their camps The industries where nice, most importantly the one giving extra housing for a city I settled of fresh water. I build some corporations later, but never made any products.

- Any surprises/frustration/elations you ran into, how did you deal with it?
If I renewed friendship with Kublai before taking the final Qin city, I might have had a trading partner/Ally to get some more boosts.

- Did you enjoy your game?
Yes very much, never had a spaceship that early

Spoiler :

 

[leif erikson]

Welcome to CivFanatics and Game of the Month.

Best of luck in future and thank you for the write up!

 

[GaidinX]

T200 SV (after T 195 CV, had removed anything that generated tourism many turns before, including avoiding allied status and open borders with anyone, but the Computers and Civic that gave +25% tourism were too much - couldn't war anyone as friendships weren't expiring or too far away)

Really fun game - the 10 pop mechanic was really powerful. I spaced my core cities to maximize growth and use of the marshes and floodplains. My goal was a peaceful game, which turned out a negative as having friendly neighbors was great for money from all my luxuries, but the boosts to culture for open borders for half the game hurt my win con. Planning for democracy and Wisselbakken was a bad idea with Monopolies and Corporations enabled.

Start - Early relic gave Lady of Reeds and Marshes - chopped for Etemenanki in cap and then Oracle - settled quickly to south, south-east and east to prevent China from spreading. Used first golden to help get a religion as the marsh wonder prevented me from being first and I lost Feed the World and culture from HS... I also ran into the early Man-at-Arms and swore the last civ would be Babylon, but was wrong. Not sure how that got boosted for the barbs as I had science lead very early with marshes and floodplains followed quickly by 10 pop cities.

Wonders: I only built ones that boosted things like science, production, amenities, or GPP/builders. Avoided my usual build them all distraction, but used lots of engineers to boost.
Cap- Etemenanki, Oracle, Pyramids, Taj Mahal, Forbidden City, and Alhambra
2nd city - Potala Palace, Petra, Kilwa Kissawani, and Ruhr Valley
3rd city - Oxford University and Estadio
4th city - Mausoleum
6th city - Terracotta (to level spies)
7th city - Big Ben (had 20k in bank when it finished, boosted to 30k)

Govt - Classical Republic (though never used the card, didn't need the extra amenities), Monarchy immediately into Theocracy (card), then Democracy for great trade bonuses with allies/CS, and finally the project boost/-10% tourism one I hoped would trash the +261% tourism bonus from monopolies. For the plaza I did Audience Chamber, Intelligence Agency, and then the boosts to projects with builders... Had diplomatic quarter positioned next to key space port locations for spy protection and got nice promotions on a few spies to increase coverage and level plus decrease the enemy - only had 2 successful hits against me - one siphon and one steal tech.

Religion - buy TS/Campus buildings with faith, +3 culture/4 followers, discount apostles/missionaries, late pickup of Stupas. Used Medieval Evangelist golden age to convert all the CS in the SE with the Fez bonus for first conversion - also converted Mongolia (Kublai), Scythia, and China as they hadn't founded a religion. Good science boosts from the larger cities to shave a few turns off.

Ages - all golden - Evangelist, Monumentality, Evangelist, production from campus.

City-States - Zanzibar and Buenos Aires early - had to fight for them all game, Zanzibar with envoys and levying Buenos Aires troops to surround them and keep Mongolia from taking them out for about half the game. I levied Fez troops in SE on finding it and got all the huts scattered around and met many CS, a few as first meets. Suz of all the production CS, 3 Science, 2 religious, 2 trade, 4 military and the single culture CS of Ayataya (sp? - 5% culture per GPP). Kilwa was nicely boosted. I completed the quests as much as possible each era.

I had tons of builders prepped when I unlocked the missions to boost the space victory - got the CV with 27 light years traveled and going 8/year - was at +10 next turn and +15 when I crossed the 50 line... So close. I lost turns due to avoiding Computers for so long - had pushed out any path except that one to avoid +25 tourism.
.

Spoiler SV :

Spoiler Cities Yields and Amenities :

 

[Brunotaurus]

First time Submission of a long time, mostly silent, board member. Bare with me.

T275 SV - 1479 Score (upload save after edit)

- What was your plan for achieving the VC? What are the major steps you planned to take? What events, if any, changed the plan in execution and to what new plan? Any interesting decision points?
I went into this as unprepared as i can be. Not having played much Civ6 yet, but being a long time Civ3,4 and 5 player. I did some readups of older AAR to learn some tricks and tried my hands on this.
Step1: Get to 3 Cities - beeline Districts somewhat so that the cost doesnt go up to much (read something about that). Go for early Empire and found more Cities. (Shanghai and Chengdu settled).
Step2: Realize that there was not a lot of room for more than 5-6 cities. Failed to Secure the spot where Ghuangzou against Qin. Realized that there was Vatican City nearby and that Lady of the Reeds and Marshes was awesome for the terrain.
- What were your initial 5-10 builds in the capital or other early cities?
Warrior, Settler, Settler. (Scout from Goodie Hut)
- Early order for technology/civics? What did you prioritize for technology/civics?
Mining, Pottery, Writing, Astrology (iirc) switched them around a bit as i was hoping to find a natural Wonder. (didn't now the maptype - didn't research)
- How did the leader bonus and civ unique ability impact your plan/play, if at all?
Step3: Realized the strong points of the Leader Bonus and immidiately focussed on growing my city to 10 after housing 11.
Read the Steam guide by ZigZagZigal to finally make a plan or to know which mechanics a beneficial.
- How many cities did you settle and/or capture? Where did you settle your first few cities?
17 cities in the end:
3+2 founded during my early expansion phase.
1 conquered from Qin when it flipped (loyalty) and razed it to found Ghuangzou.
3 conquered from Qin right after when i decided that no war at all was too boring.
1 founded on Sri Lanka when i had the idea of colonizing Oceania.
1 City State captured because i was unsure where and if to pump settlers for expansion.
5 cities with loyalty issues where captured and stabilized with a war against Scythia. mostly just to play around and have something more to do then skipping.

- What were key production/purchase focuses?
Managed to build Etemenaki by pure luck - i guess. I didn't know which tech unlocked it and saw it as an option in Beijing and actually managed to build it with 2 chops. (Non magnus too)
bought builders in the liang? city to get housing up as soon as i realized "Step3".
- Pantheon chosen and why? Religious beliefs chosen, and why?
Lady - for terrain bonus
- What governments did you select? What key policy cards did you use? Why?
Oligarchy because i didn't plan. Then Classical Republic for being better. ->Monarchy->Communism->Digital Democracy (way to late, should have focussed more on getting there)
- Which Governors were most important; when and why?
Can't tell, i went with Amani first for Suzerains, totally overvalueing Vatican City in the beginng but then using it for Hong Kong. Used Liang then for Builder charge and chaotically leveled the others later.
Magnus was super late, since there are not many woods near the start.
- Was diplomacy/trading useful? How? Relations with other civs?
I've sold my cotton and sugar quite often in the beginning to get more builders, maybe a trader and a slinger too.
- When did you have Dark/Golden ages?
Dark ages might have been good, but i've mostly had Golden ages. Didn't track them, didn't plan/optimize them.
- How did the game modes affect or impact your play?
I've upgraded the luxuries when i saw the option too and enjoyed the growth bonus to shanghai.

I've barely fought with the Barbarians and wasted a lot of gold to buy a galley from the barbs which they destroyed asap - lol.
The massive amount of CS created by the barb mechanic was a bit annoying to manage in the lategame. I picked the best bonus CS and then tried to Suz all Orange and Blue CS and get the 6+ bonus.

- Any surprises/frustration/elations you ran into, how did you deal with it?
I actually liked it that there was not much to chop rush, since i don't really know how to optimize that.

Also i was super late to settle Wuhan to secure the Iron (after oil was unlocked, i finally decided to get to the desert)
Should have done that way earlier.

The terrain made my starting position super safe with the choke point north of Beijing. Yijang was also reasonably save since that desert was jammed with City State units.

- Did you enjoy your game?
Yes! I would never have played a non-globe maptype without it. Withouth the 6otM series in general. I'm now going to replay older seeds just for my own fun. Thanks a lot for running these. LOVING IT!

Spoiler Screenshot End :

 

[Pedro Marques]

Very first comment here in the forum, but i have been playing your games for some time now. Just wanted to thank you guys! Its turn 100 and im having a absolutely blast! By the time the run is finished i will do the end report for you. Spoiler alert, its not gonna be the most optimal game since i want this one to last as long as possible kkkkkk. Anyways, thanks again for the amazing job at refreshing our beloved game! Keep it up!

 

[leif erikson]

Welcome to CivFanatics and Game of the Month.

Glad to hear you are enjoying yourself.

 

[leif erikson]

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