6otM31 After Action

[leif erikson]

Welcome to the 6otM31 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 attached your victory save to your post.

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
- What was your most useful unit?
- Was diplomacy useful? How?
- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Domination VC?
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
- Did you enjoy the game?

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

Players are encouraged to provide feedback on the game. Some players like to replay the game, and although we will not record the results from a replay, you can still post your new experiences (please state if the game is a replay). Please refrain from posting videos until the deadline for submission is over.

 

[JoZilla]

Domination Victory T122 / 150 AD

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
Settled 3 initially and 2 more later in the game with capture settlers

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
First Bronze Working to get encampment and great general as fast as possible. Rome was doing 5 GG points early and had I was barely able to get it. I had 2 encampments, 1 barracks and had to do 2 encampment projects to make sure I get it before Romans. I also tried to sell Romans stuff to get their money out, so they would not buy the GG.

Prioritized to Political Philosophy, which I got at T50. I was able to hit all eurekas.

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
Didn't wipe anyone completely. AI was crazy wiping the city states.

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
First thought about horsemen as there was so many horses. But there was also Iron and I got Oligarchy quite fast.

Horsemen are a lot faster, but I could produce swordsmen a lot quicker. Just build warriors with 50% card and upgrade them with the money I got from selling the 3 horse resources.

Swordsmen can also be upgraded to muskets a lot earlier than horsemen to Cossacs.


- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
I got it only to fight at 3 last cities. Cossack is nice, but came too late for me.

- What was your most useful unit?
The first general was really useful as always.

- Was diplomacy useful? How?
I made a lot of money selling horses and other resources.

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Not much help of city states in this game. I didn't build lots of districts either.

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Culture VC?
This was Domination, right? Getting 1st general was plan number 1. Then tought between horse- and swordsmen and decided to go with swords.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
Surprised by how easy Deity game this was.

- Did you enjoy the game?
I did enjoy a smooth conquest. It was fun, but maybe a bit too easy in the end. Usually Deity is still good challenge but this game it was quite easy. Or maybe I'm just getting so damn good

 

[Chalcedon]

Domination victory t218, 1535AD, 1220 points
Woohooo! I just finished my first 6otM , and it was really fun! Definetly gonna check out the older ones whilst waiting for the next.
Thanks a lot for making these, normally I only play against human players, but this series seems to be a really nice expansion to the game! Again, thanks a lot!

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?

36. Settled 5 (two of them late game, probably shouldn´t have done this), captured 31. Razed a Chinese one, liberated some CSs and deleted a bunch of captured settlers... had amenity issues all game.

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?

Most things here happened in the turns 1-100, pls see the Opening Actions thread.
At that point, when starting war against Rome, my core army consisted mainly of Musketeers/Field Canons and some Warrior Monks. Had serious trouble with Roman city defenses, even with the siege stuff, so I went for Bombards (which did not really help due to the terrain and swarms of Cavalry/ATs, and kinda went for Infantry. After that I beelined Merchant Republic as I normally do. Then I rememberd something called "Theocracy unit purchase with faith" I know, I really should play other civs (incl. Russia) apart from my standard ones ...
So I switched research/civics, adopted Theocracy and purchased bunches of Cossacks and beelined Artillery. Could have saved a lot of turns here. Nothing special after that apart from Communism (as Russia I preferred it over Fascism) and the Helicopter technology (strangely I was able to get it really quick without beelining it, different from far more earlier era techs).

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?

No, none.
At first, I wanted to liberate Kandy, so I left Sumeria one city in the west. After struggling a lot with Roman defenses, their huge army and vast empire, I took only the production/science/culture powerhouses, same with Greece (was in fear of an enemy culture or science victory by one of them),but also due to turns going by, I left them some cities (Rome three I guess and Greece 5). From the others I almost only took those on the path to Nidaros. It was alright, but the constant denouncing kept a bit annoying

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?

This was the most interesting part of the game to me, as my army changed a lot, unlike in my normal games where focus mainly rests on few kinds of units.
Started out with 2 warriors, 6 (5?) archers, 2 spearmen, and some warrior monks, as I wanted to try them out, as well as one siege tower and one ram. Against Gilgamesh and the barbs this force was highly effective, but even with upgrades it was nearly useless against Trajan. Unfortunately at this point the warrior monks were really vulnerable and did not make it to the 4th promotion, so they had to secure the eastern borders against the barbs, gaining almost zero experience. I guess they would be neat on lower difficulties, on this approach they were only useful as a swordsmen/musketmen supplement, as the AIs armies were far more advanced afterwards.
With the huge Cossack purchase (although in first place I forgot about the faith purchase option I did not want to prebuild Horsemen in numbers) I added some artilleries, which were of use in the late "mid-game", but were kinda slow compared to the Cossacks (except the one with "expert crew" on it). A knight into modern armour was nice but situational due to all the ATs around. Cossacks (mainly corps and armies - there was just not enough space to bring in all otherwise) were upgraded to Helicopters when fighting with Scythia and Norway, the last two civs with a capital remaining.
Due to the space and the siege support being really slow, I actually did decide to build some ships in my de-facto capital Smolensk south of Yosemite in order to crush Nidaros´ city defenses for the Helicopters, but somehow the Battleships were not strong enough against Harald´s Caravels, Frigates and Ironclads and my little Armada sunk (after they did surprisingly little damage to the defenses of the city).
I also planned to bring in some airpower just for fun, but as usual, it did not happen...

- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
As said, I prebuilt none, but with approx. 190-250 faith per turn the costs were nothing, and the swarms of it were everywhere ... From mid-game onwards, they were reeeally useful.

- What was your most useful unit?

The swarms of upgraded Helicopter armies led by Georgyi Zhukov for the SSRs glory were devastating!
But the siege units and expert marksmen field canons were invaluable as well...

- Was diplomacy useful? How?

Diplo only was annoying, as in any war game.
On this point, I really look forward to the upcoming governor and city-flipping mechanics with rise and fall, and wonder how this would have turned out with all the small satellite states around me...

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?

Geneva and Stockholm as well as Jerusalem and Kandy were helpful. Rome and Greece gave me both a hard time with Stockholm (ended up with 14 envoys there, at least being the souzerain), but with all the districts it was really nice to have. Would have loved Carthage with all the encampments around, but the others where so hard competing for it that I decided to stick with Stockholm. CSs in the west were all overtaken by the main civs before I met them, and probably very early on.

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Culture VC?

The Domination VC I gained by constant war, despite the gap for unit upgrading after dealing with Sumeria. ;-)

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?

First there was me not noticing the option of the theocracy cossack purchase, which was just me being dumb. Could have saved a lot of turns there I guess. Surprise was the huge science output of the AIs, despite having almost no campi, as well as the masses of advanced corps/armies they had... But Rome´s massive expansion (being my only real neighbour after early game Sumeria) was really a surprise, together with the terrain it really slowed things down. I wonder what would have happened if Greece or another AI would have fought with them. I dealt with that by keeping punching... ;-) Maybe I should have circled the other way around, doing Germany, China, Scythia and Norway before, but Rome and Greece seemed so much more advanced that I decided to for them first, not allowing an easy Culture or late Science victory to them. Also the sheer number of enemy units and the strong city defenses did not really allow a split of my army, only when invading rome via the Hong Kong-Lisbon-routes... What do you think about that problem?
Funny enough, Norways and Scythias military strength was as high or higher as mine all game long, but when my forces arrived the had decimated each other A LOT

- Did you enjoy the game?

I enjoyed it a lot, especially the diversity of units I had in use. I also played a little bit around religion (not only the monks) by using the Crusader belief, at least a little vs. Rome. Normally I am not a huge fan of domination, but on deity in this scenario it is very entertaining.
Again, thanks again for making these , I will have a look just yet in the previous games

Btw I would love if you would implement Rise&Fall mechanics and civs to the series asap, as I cant wait until the release

 

[FurionHuang]

139t finished.

Attached autosave 1t after victory.

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
Settled 6, captured 14 cities.
- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Tech: Horseback riding - Stirrups - Military Science
Civic: Mercenaries - Reformed Church
- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
No. Need them for trading...
- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Early game warrior, archer, then warrior upgrade to swordsman for first 2 neighbors. Main Army was then Horseman, followed by pre-produced Heavy Chariot upgraded to Knights. Lastly Horseman upgrade to Cossack to finish off game.
- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
Love it! Final lethal assault main force.
- What was your most useful unit?
Very funny I give this credit to my only missionary! Till 120t I had no idea where the Vikings were but saw their missionaries pop from west. So sent one to that direction and found Nidaros!
- Was diplomacy useful? How?
Rome was my only friend until I showed my real agenda. All denounced so very difficult to trade. Well, dorm game what can I expect.
- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
I paid few attention to city-states. Though Lisbon saved me from bankrupt after I sent 3 envoys.
- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Culture VC?
Pretty crappy planning... Lost first 2 GGs so putting Athens under siege took quite a long time. But with the Renaissance/Industrial GG on my side, the rest of the game was pretty smooth.
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
Gilgamesh dared declare another war on me. Well I had Cossack and Field Canon, what could his War Carts do? Ended up with sending me more gold.
- Did you enjoy the game?
Very good map! I actually would like to play CV again. Indeed enjoyed it.

Spoiler After victory screenshot :

 

[seb_schmitt]

Domination victory in turn 208

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
Settled three, two of them with snatched settlers, captured more than 20

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Archers, then Swordsmen, focus on eurekas.

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
Frederik and Trajan didn't make it to the end.

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Archers, Warrios, Horsemen, Catapults, Chariots, upgrading each of them asap.

- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
Mostly against late barbs because of fast movement.

- What was your most useful unit?
Archers / Crossbowmen and Ram

- Was diplomacy useful? How?
Sold some luxuries in the early game.

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Captures Geneve and Jerusalem, tried to suzerain the rest of them, liberated Vilnius and Lisboa

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Domination VC?
Early archer rush on Geneve and Jerusalem, take on Gilgamesh, then whoever comes in my way.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
None at all

- Did you enjoy the game?
Although it was on deity level, it felt a bit easy going. Was so relaxed, I missed out focussing on domination victory in the mid game. Still liked the game, because it went so smooth.

Thanks for the game!

 

[LordWeaver]

Victory by Domination at 1848AD, turn 295, ranking: 1723



Thanks for the game, that was indeed a pretty fun one!


- How many cities did you settle, or capture?

I settled 8 cities, 5 over the first 100 turns, 1 on mid game after taking rome (was afraid to take some attack from the right side) and two on the late game (Uranium and Coal).
39 cities conquered, including 2 liberated (Hong Kong and Nan Madol)

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?

The first 100t was:
Tech: Currency, Apprenticeship and Machinery.
Civic: Theology, Feudalism and Reformed Church

100t+:
Tech: Metal Casting, Military science, Steel/Combustion
Civic: Nationalism, Mobilization and Class Struggle

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?

Yes, unfortunately I took Frederick's head and threw it on Gilgamesh's face. But yeah, germany was wiped out.

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?

I used just land units, Pike/Muskets+Crossbows+Bombards, Cossacks + Bombards/Artillery, Tank/Cossack + Artillery + Infantry and last Heli+Modern Armor+Rocket Artillery and a couple Mech Infantry/Modern AT.

- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?

Yes, I made a timing attack using it, Theocracy+Cossacks. Got 4 or 5 with faith and ran Gilgamesh's empire.

- What was your most useful unit?

By far the spy. With him I could delay Harald's launchings and industrial zones from him and Tomyris.

- Was diplomacy useful? How?

For me it was. Once I saw Sumeria, I tried to get his friendship as fast as I could, so he could leave me alone. Once that happened I just had my focus on developing my civ, got some settlers and archers to keep barbarian away. Afterwards I used his war against Frederick to rise my empire.
The AI was pretty expansionist and Rome/Sumeria was aways trying to get me to declare war towards the another one. So I was able to do some joint wars and abuse their millitary for that.

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?

Since I got a religion, Jerusalem was so good for me, the pressure made me conquer all Sumeria, before attacking him, and Rome afterwards with the religion. And Geneva was so solid for the first 100 turns, since I was pacifist for that period, with science and for the barbarians (the right side of the empire never got a single attack thanks to Geneva)

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Domination VC?

This was my first 6otM and Deity run on civ 6 so I was kinda nervous. My strategy was to survive the first "big onslaught", but since Sumeria was my neighbour I got him to be my friend and never needed to worry from an attack. So I just stood there and developed my empire to a minimal for the war, got my religion, some commercial districts, encampments, etc, waiting for an oportunity.
So the oportunity came when Gilgamesh conquered Fred's capital and made peace. I just took that "leftover" and started my true agenda. I started with some Pikes and Crossbowmans for the German (leftover from Gilgamesh), after that I stabbed Gilg's back conquering his capital (he was by far the most dangerous of them all with 150+science), with the help of some Bombards and Muskets + Crossbowns (against some AT and Field Cannons and 2 or 3 artillery), and the rest of his empire, using the so loved Cossacks. Rome was the next target and I started with Lisbon (under his control) by that time I was the second in science but wasn't even close of his techs, I managed to enter his empire and after a brief peace I entered the "road for Rome".
Gilgamesh was still in the game with German's capital, so I captured it with the help of my Tanks (Corp) and artillery, China fell easily (was kinda weak on this game, probably because of the constant war with Rome)
Scythia was pretty HUGE with a lot of Cavalry Army, she had 4k and I was with 1.5k (army power) I think, but I abused the AI's lack of knowledge of warfare and got his capital.
By this time we were already on a race for the win, Harald launching projects and Pericles close by, so I went for nuke and finished the game taking both Harald and Pericles capitals.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?

Yes, once I ran over Gilgamesh I got a little cocky and thought I could ran through Trajan as well. But I got a little surprise, actually, 3 little surprises. My army was devastated by 3 Helicopter (army). So that kinda took me by surprise hahahaha the rest was pretty standard for what I thought it would be.

- Did you enjoy the game?

It was really tense for me, since it was my first Deity gameplay. I was slow and patient but that was really fun. It was a full experience for me ahahaha

Spoiler End game map :

 

[seb_schmitt]

Played again with JoZillas Strategy, but didn't manage to get the first great general. Ended up with more then 120 turns before even capturing half of the capitals. So I guess, the game is quite challeging, I just was lucky in my first run, where I easily got the first two generals. Those really seem to make the difference.

 

[daheat43]

Got crushed - twice. At least the was a relatively quick way to play in real life minutes! And I stand humbled: for all its flaws, civ 6 deity is too much for me at present. Retired after spending all my time on holy site prayers only to not get a religion... and i was in classical while Gilgameshe entered Rennaisance.

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
2 settled.

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Was going for banking eventually; excited about Zimbabwe in Moscow city to the north.

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
Myself

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Slingers to archers, warriors to swords.

- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
...

- What was your most useful unit?
archers

- Was diplomacy useful? How?
didn't die; sent trade route to Gilga

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
....

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Domination VC?
...

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
Barbs were a bear. Had to build an armyto counter them, thought I would use it on gilga, realized Gilga was way too advanced... then retired.

- Did you enjoy the game?
Yes, thanks for putting it together

Also: no crashes this game for what it's worth, since I was so whiny about that last time.

 

[daheat43]

Ugh - just played a 3rd round. Made it 55 turns before losing my whole army to barbs and retiring. I feel like I'm playing against barbarians. Anyone else have trouble with these? Obvi I am not ready for deity but OMG: the barbarians field one giant army of horse archers and horsemen after another. It's nuts. But I guess i like it better than before when I complained that the game was too easy ;-)

Why are the barbs so much more competent than the other full Civs? Is it my imagination, or something about programming? Maybe that other civs don't prioritize military or upgrade, while barbs are always making new units?

BTW, this is not my pic, but it felt like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/64v1qb/how_do_i_deal_with_barbarians_in_civ_6/

And maybe this is relevant, military first: https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/5q8pgk/when_the_barbarians_are_a_better_military_civ/

My build order was:
Scout, builder, lavra, (buy slinger), settler, shrine, slinger, spear, trader, settler (50% off), encampment

Second city: lavra, builder

 

[johnniewalk]

i will play and come back with all your question f to answers,thanks for the post.

 

[FurionHuang]

Ugh - just played a 3rd round. Made it 55 turns before losing my whole army to barbs and retiring. I feel like I'm playing against barbarians. Anyone else have trouble with these? Obvi I am not ready for deity but OMG: the barbarians field one giant army of horse archers and horsemen after another. It's nuts. But I guess i like it better than before when I complained that the game was too easy ;-)

Why are the barbs so much more competent than the other full Civs? Is it my imagination, or something about programming? Maybe that other civs don't prioritize military or upgrade, while barbs are always making new units?

BTW, this is not my pic, but it felt like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/64v1qb/how_do_i_deal_with_barbarians_in_civ_6/

And maybe this is relevant, military first: https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/5q8pgk/when_the_barbarians_are_a_better_military_civ/

My build order was:
Scout, builder, lavra, (buy slinger), settler, shrine, slinger, spear, trader, settler (50% off), encampment

Second city: lavra, builder

1. Feels like too late for the 1st settler, scout start then upon reaching pop 2 you can start your first. Find Sumerian ASAP, trade your lux for their gold.
2. Early builder can use for improving lux and sell it to AI for purchasing 2nd settler. But on this map the closest lux needs plantation, so maybe you should consider found city on it.
3. Sell horses, there are plenty of them. They worth a lot of cash.
4. Use Agoge for slinger/warriro production, hold Archery until you have 3-5 then use traded gold to upgrade. More efficient than just prod them (Carthage is too far away, you won't get early unit prod buff). One warrior is enough to clear the barb outpost near Geneva. For the other one might spawn deep in tundra tiles, kill the barb scout before it goes back to outpost, 2 archers 1 warrior/scout should be able to deal with it. Then, all clear, no more barbs. Remember, find and clear the outposts especially near horse resources, otherwise it's a game over.
5. For getting 40% off Encampment, I built 3 Lavras before finishing Bronze Working. Then the first 2 Encampments will have discount. Compete Classical GG, you can have it.

 

[Falabello]

Domination Victory - Turn 158

- Did you enjoy the game?
Yep, very much. Thanks for one more game !

 

[Fivethumbs]

t140 domination victory

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
settled 2, ~24 captured, settled 2 more with captured settlers (~28 cities in the end)

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
bronze/iron working -> crossbowmen -> musket -> cossack
oligarchy -> monarchy -> (too late mercenaries) -> theocracy -> nationalism

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
by ~t80 captured Sumeria/Germany capitals, wiped Germany
~t100 Rome
~t120 China and Greece (split armies)
~t135 Scythia
t140 Norway

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
slingers/warriors (~5 each), Ram, GG, upgrade to archers/swords, then upgraded again, then ~6 horsemen built with discount to be upgraded to Cossacks. Random knight.
3 scouts found all the civs, shared capital info very early (all except Scythia)

- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
Used first Cossacks for China capital, then Scythia/Norway. Using Cossacks won several turns. Muskets/Xbows move so slow.

- What was your most useful unit?
First general and Ram

- Was diplomacy useful? How?
Joint war with Germany vs Sumeria, then joint war with Sumeria vs Germany. Sumeria became Ally and cash-cow for the whole game.

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Carthage was good for additional Trade Routes.
Early Geneva/Jerusalem envoy helped with Pantheon/Research.
Otherwise pretty automatic.

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Domination VC?
Settle on Tobacco for faith to get pantheon. After scout found Jerusalem, got God of Forge pretty quickly.
Build order I believe was Scout->Builder->Settler->Slingers/Warriors, Encampement when able.
Lots of barb horsemen, but rivers helped much.
Encampement for GG. After Iron was revealed started producing warriors, upgraded to swordsmen and started war vs Sumeria.
Conquest went almost as fast as the Ram could move.
At turn ~70 started building random simcity stuff, lost focus for domination victory condition.
At turn ~90 ran out of money and could not afford to upgrade archers to xbows, and swordsmen to muskets. Didn't sell enough stuff to AI.
Got last religion (from Germanys holy sites) ~t100 with Tithe, which helped with money somewhat. Overlooked Mercenaries policy - got it too late.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
Surprised how beneficial are additional tiles when settling (Russia's trait)
After conquered Sumeria tried to heal swordsmen for a few turns, unsuccessfully - it turned out that barbs had the single iron mine pillaged
3 scouts (1 built, other found in huts) resulted in massive amount of huts and all AI capitals found pretty early.
Not sure how to get to the first government faster - by t50 had only early empires, despite hitting all the inspirations. Probably need to cash-buy monument or smth.

- Did you enjoy the game?
Yes. Fastest win yet.

 

[Fivethumbs]

and the victorious image

 

[daheat43]

Domination
Turn 171
Year 1100
Score 786

Victory! Took five times, but I won. First deity victory, with some coaching from the Opening Actions thread.

Keys to victory were: Early Lavras for religion, otherwise I missed it; sell luxes early for cash to buy an extra settler; and five slingers upgraded (another lux sold) for an early archer rush.

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
Settled 3, captured a ton, toward the end razed quite a few

settle on lux and trade it

scout,builder, builder (half of one. oops!!) Lavra, settler, finish builder, slinger, slinger, slinger, slinger, warrior, archer, spear (for barbs), archer, archer, builder (for iron mine)
builder, trader, ram, catapult


2nd city: lavra (on 5 special wonder tile - would you do that? bought it for 90), slinger, slinger/archer, archer, warrior, builder, builder, campus
3rd city: slinger/archer, lavra, builder


- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
astrology (up to boost point), animal hus, opottery, irrigation, mining, wheel, start bronze, start masonry, switch to archery, finish bronze (boosted), horseback riding (boosted)
finish masonry, iron working, writing, engineering, machinery, currency (boosted), apprentice boosted,

code of law, craftsman, foreign trade, mysticism, early empire, military trad, state work, political philos (boosted)
drama/poetry, theology

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
Germany and, just to do somethign with my cossacks at the end, Nan Modol, Viking ally, where I had just 1 envoy.

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Core of army was archers, upgraded from slingers, with I think 2 warriors upgraded to swords. Built 1 cat and a ram when my first assault on Sumeria killed his army but couldn't take Uruk.
Then I started mass producing half-cost horsemen, and they were core from then until cossocks. And then at the end I built another bombard then bought many of those and cossocks with faith. And one caraval, which participated in siege of Viking cap and helped capture it one turn earlier than otherwise.


- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
Yeah, they were fun! Unbelievable how tough they are versus earlier units and cities. And the 1 turn pillaging was NUTS. I just wrecked the lands of Greece and Scythia since I didn't want to take their cities. FOUR pillages in one turn on some holy sites.


- What was your most useful unit?
Why do people say GG? Am I missing something? I got those around rennaisance but not earlier. Most useful was horse probably for sieges. And bombard/cat or ram -- useless without those.


- Was diplomacy useful? How?
Sold a bunch of luxes til everyone hated me. Wasn't long before that happened, but that got my economy off to a solid start. I ran deficit for a long time off of 600 gold stacked up; Carthage and hubs helped resolve that. 24 trade routes at end I think, mostly to Kandy for gold and faith.


- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Carthage was a great help. The others probably boosted me but weren't as obvious. I prioritized faith early, then carthage and economic ones, then science ones.

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Domination VC?
Early faith for Defenders of the Faith,which helped with barbs and some with Sumeria. And monks which gave cheap melee units for early wars.
Joint wars with possible and sold resources while able. But not strategic ones to nearterm targets.
Early rush at Uruk (joint war w germany). Took down walls on turn 60 with archers but brought no ram -- carts everywhere. Peace/withdrew, came back for capture on turn 90.
94 war on germany (joint w china). 94-101 buy five warrior monks. 107 Aachen falls; 112 Germany gone.
110 suzerain carthage.
112 Get joint war vs Greece with Rome, then DOW Rome. Reputation was trashed anyway.
119 found 3rd and last city for pearl resource up north; it never gets big.
122 Capture Ostia, which finished Mont St Michel one turn earlier (cool)
Then went for Rome but stalled outside his walls; pikes vs my horses. Made peace and got cities north and south of Rome.
130 DOW China. 135 Chengdu falls (raze). 138 Xian encampment falls. 144 Xian falls. Got three cities to south and west in peace deal-- hard on happiness but opens way to Scythia.
149 Cossacks laying waste to Scythian hordes of horse archers and horsemen and archers. Sad but FUN. A little worried when I see Sumeria has arty ahead of me, but they are going for Rome.
Building factories and stuff. Prob shoudl've just done encamp and hub projects; didn't realized how close to the end I was. Faith purchasing cossacks and bombards right at the front (not just my religion cities like civ5) led to QUICK progress.
156 Pokrov falls. Don't make peace to leave way open to Norway. Need to find that cap still.
157 DOW Vikings
158 tech steel
160 Bloodiest turn of the game for me; lost a monk to a Scythian city center as he pillaged, and a Cossack (only loss of those) to a Norwegian cav who came from the fog
161 arty opens up on athens; it falls
163 DOW Rome.
164 Rome falls -- no siege towers or anything. Just a horde of cossacks and an arty or two.
171 Nidaros falls for the win. It was fun closing in from all sides, laying waste with arty, cossacks, some new faith purchased tanks, and even a caravel who had come from the west, my only ship of the game.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
A little surprised I won! And so fast by the end, the snowball was unbelievable. Happiness was neutral or slightly neg by the end, but I started razing captured cities and building arenas. Sure could've used zoos! Too early.
It was nice having no one to the east. That was a little weird.
It was nice to have the extra land in Russian cities -- one fewer thing to worry about. Big advantage probably.
And I used trade routes as much as I could to catch up on culture and science. That helped, I'm sure.

- Did you enjoy the game?
Totally, thanks!

 

[FurionHuang]

Domination
Turn 171
Year 1100
Score 786

Victory! Took five times, but I won. First deity victory, with some coaching from the Opening Actions thread.

Keys to victory were: Early Lavras for religion, otherwise I missed it; sell luxes early for cash to buy an extra settler; and five slingers upgraded (another lux sold) for an early archer rush.

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
Settled 3, captured a ton, toward the end razed quite a few

settle on lux and trade it

scout,builder, builder (half of one. oops!!) Lavra, settler, finish builder, slinger, slinger, slinger, slinger, warrior, archer, spear (for barbs), archer, archer, builder (for iron mine)
builder, trader, ram, catapult


2nd city: lavra (on 5 special wonder tile - would you do that? bought it for 90), slinger, slinger/archer, archer, warrior, builder, builder, campus
3rd city: slinger/archer, lavra, builder


- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
astrology (up to boost point), animal hus, opottery, irrigation, mining, wheel, start bronze, start masonry, switch to archery, finish bronze (boosted), horseback riding (boosted)
finish masonry, iron working, writing, engineering, machinery, currency (boosted), apprentice boosted,

code of law, craftsman, foreign trade, mysticism, early empire, military trad, state work, political philos (boosted)
drama/poetry, theology

- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history?
Germany and, just to do somethign with my cossacks at the end, Nan Modol, Viking ally, where I had just 1 envoy.

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Core of army was archers, upgraded from slingers, with I think 2 warriors upgraded to swords. Built 1 cat and a ram when my first assault on Sumeria killed his army but couldn't take Uruk.
Then I started mass producing half-cost horsemen, and they were core from then until cossocks. And then at the end I built another bombard then bought many of those and cossocks with faith. And one caraval, which participated in siege of Viking cap and helped capture it one turn earlier than otherwise.


- Did you use your UU? Was it useful?
Yeah, they were fun! Unbelievable how tough they are versus earlier units and cities. And the 1 turn pillaging was NUTS. I just wrecked the lands of Greece and Scythia since I didn't want to take their cities. FOUR pillages in one turn on some holy sites.


- What was your most useful unit?
Why do people say GG? Am I missing something? I got those around rennaisance but not earlier. Most useful was horse probably for sieges. And bombard/cat or ram -- useless without those.


- Was diplomacy useful? How?
Sold a bunch of luxes til everyone hated me. Wasn't long before that happened, but that got my economy off to a solid start. I ran deficit for a long time off of 600 gold stacked up; Carthage and hubs helped resolve that. 24 trade routes at end I think, mostly to Kandy for gold and faith.


- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Carthage was a great help. The others probably boosted me but weren't as obvious. I prioritized faith early, then carthage and economic ones, then science ones.

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Domination VC?
Early faith for Defenders of the Faith,which helped with barbs and some with Sumeria. And monks which gave cheap melee units for early wars.
Joint wars with possible and sold resources while able. But not strategic ones to nearterm targets.
Early rush at Uruk (joint war w germany). Took down walls on turn 60 with archers but brought no ram -- carts everywhere. Peace/withdrew, came back for capture on turn 90.
94 war on germany (joint w china). 94-101 buy five warrior monks. 107 Aachen falls; 112 Germany gone.
110 suzerain carthage.
112 Get joint war vs Greece with Rome, then DOW Rome. Reputation was trashed anyway.
119 found 3rd and last city for pearl resource up north; it never gets big.
122 Capture Ostia, which finished Mont St Michel one turn earlier (cool)
Then went for Rome but stalled outside his walls; pikes vs my horses. Made peace and got cities north and south of Rome.
130 DOW China. 135 Chengdu falls (raze). 138 Xian encampment falls. 144 Xian falls. Got three cities to south and west in peace deal-- hard on happiness but opens way to Scythia.
149 Cossacks laying waste to Scythian hordes of horse archers and horsemen and archers. Sad but FUN. A little worried when I see Sumeria has arty ahead of me, but they are going for Rome.
Building factories and stuff. Prob shoudl've just done encamp and hub projects; didn't realized how close to the end I was. Faith purchasing cossacks and bombards right at the front (not just my religion cities like civ5) led to QUICK progress.
156 Pokrov falls. Don't make peace to leave way open to Norway. Need to find that cap still.
157 DOW Vikings
158 tech steel
160 Bloodiest turn of the game for me; lost a monk to a Scythian city center as he pillaged, and a Cossack (only loss of those) to a Norwegian cav who came from the fog
161 arty opens up on athens; it falls
163 DOW Rome.
164 Rome falls -- no siege towers or anything. Just a horde of cossacks and an arty or two.
171 Nidaros falls for the win. It was fun closing in from all sides, laying waste with arty, cossacks, some new faith purchased tanks, and even a caravel who had come from the west, my only ship of the game.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
A little surprised I won! And so fast by the end, the snowball was unbelievable. Happiness was neutral or slightly neg by the end, but I started razing captured cities and building arenas. Sure could've used zoos! Too early.
It was nice having no one to the east. That was a little weird.
It was nice to have the extra land in Russian cities -- one fewer thing to worry about. Big advantage probably.
And I used trade routes as much as I could to catch up on culture and science. That helped, I'm sure.

- Did you enjoy the game?
Totally, thanks!

Good job buddy!

 

[daheat43]

Thanks! Thanks for your tips! It really is all about the early choices... and early Wars.

Nice use of your missionary as a scout by the way. I built one scout and got two from huts, so my scouting was a lot better in this game then other ones. But I still didn’t find Nidaros till I could afford a Cossack to go scouting in enemy territory.

 

[^MeSSiaH^]

Gratz

A few tips based on your game. Im not a great player by any means, but anyway:

1. Build order:

scout,builder, builder (half of one. oops!!) Lavra, settler, finish builder, slinger, slinger, slinger, slinger, warrior, archer, spear (for barbs), archer, archer, builder (for iron mine)
builder, trader, ram, catapult
2nd city: lavra (on 5 special wonder tile - would you do that? bought it for 90), slinger, slinger/archer, archer, warrior, builder, builder, campus
3rd city: slinger/archer, lavra, builder

#1 (major) - Dont rush religion in non-religious victory - it slows you down, not worth it. Every lavra is 10t+ you dont produce units or encampment or first/second settler
#2 (minor) - Too many builders - your cities will do with few upgraded tiles - only the ones with strat resources and luxes. In this game 2-3 early builders were enough. 5 is overkill. Look at this this way - builder is 50 cogs. If he nets you 2 cogs from improvements, you need 25 turns to pay him off, this comes so late its almost not worth it
#3 (major) - where is the encampment? Like your most important thing to build in almost every type of victory on Diety. 2 eurekas, no need for 2nd strat resource and most important - Great General (GG).
If you want to effectively wage war - early GG is ESSENTIAL - it is worth to rush the guy. Some ppl here produced the encampment event to make some more GG points - well worth it
#4 - Rule of thumb is that if you have horses in plenty - its easier to go with horsemen - you can win half of the map with those guys and a GG (5 movement units is nuts). The only thing you need to remember is Battering Ram. So after an early archer rush, you generally cant go wrong with either horsement, of chariots upgraded to Knights (better if you are late to the party with horsemen)

2. Science:

astrology (up to boost point), animal hus, opottery, irrigation, mining, wheel, start bronze, start masonry, switch to archery, finish bronze (boosted), horseback riding (boosted)
finish masonry, iron working, writing, engineering, machinery, currency (boosted), apprentice boosted,

You should prioritise what leads you to victory. For domination its military - so Archers -> Bronze (encampment) -> Horseback Riding ->Masonry (Ram) -> Knights would be good idea for start (with some eureka management of course and writing somewhere I think). Irrigation early is debatable - did you need this lux to trade it asap and had a builder charge to spare? If not, maybe was worth postponing and prioritising BW or archery?

Cheers,

 

[daheat43]

Hey, thanks for the tips, Messiah. Always awesome to hear feedback.

I guess you're right about the encampments -- if I'd done that instead of Lavras, I could have rushed a GG instead of the prophet. Or I could have just build more warriors and not needed the warrior monks. I thought I needed Defender of the Faith for horse barbs, but they didn't bother me much this round -- unlike the other tries.

I kind of underrate encampments and GGs compared to other people. I feel like the promotions are generally situational, even more so than, say, the open or rough terrain bonus paths of Civ5. So I figure I'll just get promotions as I go. And maybe I'm missing something about the GGs. Does the extra 20% or whatever really give such an edge? People seem to swear by them.

On builders, I prob did build too many. I don't remember when they were, but I did a few Builder Waves based on choosing builder policy cards for ten turns or so. So I wound up a couple of times with TONS of builders. Sounds like that was too many. I hooked up all my resources and wound up making more mines and farms than I needed.

I won't forget the Ram next time. That was frustrating to be stymied at Uruk's gate. It was also super frustrating that Uruk built an Encampment BEHIND some of my forces and ON TOP OF one of my archers. So I had to sue for peace and come back 30 turns later.

I probably should have sold the horses and iron, but I didn't know who had what... and I didn't want to give any near enemies new tools to build a better army. Seems like most people did sell their strategics, tho.

On the science, I mostly went for cheap things throughout the game -- both in science and culture. I rarely beelined things before getting the eureka/inspiration, unless I was sure I wouldn't get it (like Build a Wonder or Build two Galleys). I intentionally delayed archery a bit to make sure I had five slingers before I got it, so I could upgrade. On Irrigation, I did want the other lux to sell for upgrades -- not sure if it was vital, though. What do you think about beelining versus going for eurekas/inspirations?

 

[FurionHuang]

Gratz

A few tips based on your game. Im not a great player by any means, but anyway:

1. Build order:

scout,builder, builder (half of one. oops!!) Lavra, settler, finish builder, slinger, slinger, slinger, slinger, warrior, archer, spear (for barbs), archer, archer, builder (for iron mine)
builder, trader, ram, catapult
2nd city: lavra (on 5 special wonder tile - would you do that? bought it for 90), slinger, slinger/archer, archer, warrior, builder, builder, campus
3rd city: slinger/archer, lavra, builder

#1 (major) - Dont rush religion in non-religious victory - it slows you down, not worth it. Every lavra is 10t+ you dont produce units or encampment or first/second settler
#2 (minor) - Too many builders - your cities will do with few upgraded tiles - only the ones with strat resources and luxes. In this game 2-3 early builders were enough. 5 is overkill. Look at this this way - builder is 50 cogs. If he nets you 2 cogs from improvements, you need 25 turns to pay him off, this comes so late its almost not worth it
#3 (major) - where is the encampment? Like your most important thing to build in almost every type of victory on Diety. 2 eurekas, no need for 2nd strat resource and most important - Great General (GG).
If you want to effectively wage war - early GG is ESSENTIAL - it is worth to rush the guy. Some ppl here produced the encampment event to make some more GG points - well worth it
#4 - Rule of thumb is that if you have horses in plenty - its easier to go with horsemen - you can win half of the map with those guys and a GG (5 movement units is nuts). The only thing you need to remember is Battering Ram. So after an early archer rush, you generally cant go wrong with either horsement, of chariots upgraded to Knights (better if you are late to the party with horsemen)

2. Science:

astrology (up to boost point), animal hus, opottery, irrigation, mining, wheel, start bronze, start masonry, switch to archery, finish bronze (boosted), horseback riding (boosted)
finish masonry, iron working, writing, engineering, machinery, currency (boosted), apprentice boosted,

You should prioritise what leads you to victory. For domination its military - so Archers -> Bronze (encampment) -> Horseback Riding ->Masonry (Ram) -> Knights would be good idea for start (with some eureka management of course and writing somewhere I think). Irrigation early is debatable - did you need this lux to trade it asap and had a builder charge to spare? If not, maybe was worth postponing and prioritising BW or archery?

Cheers,

I was kinda swaying btw early Lavra and Encampment but eventually Lavra for several reasons.
If it's not Russia with half price Holy Site there's no debate Encampment straight. But it's Russia. Early Lavra means you can start Great Writer competition really early and almost for sure you can get first even first 3 GWs. Even for Dom Victory early GW means great boost to your culture yield and you can reach Mercenary faster (so that your Knight army can be on battlefield earlier), then Reformed Churches faster (so that you can faith purchase your final batch of Cossack or other necessary units earlier). This is the unique advantage of Russia. You're right about GP, don't have to compete for religion.
With 3 half price Lavra built, then you can have 2 40% off Encampments. Also by the time you might have 30% Encampment prod policy ready, boooooost. This needs to hold Writing, Drama, Entertainment unfinished before you put down the 2 Encampments and Bronze unfinished before the 3rd Lavra is done. A little micro here but worth it. Drawback is, you might loose classic GG (but you have faith, check great person panel every turn and maybe you can patron classic GG before AI got him)