6otM76 After Action

[leif erikson]

Welcome to the 6otM76 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?
- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
- Did you use your UU/UB? Were they 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?
- Did religion play a role in your game?
- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Religious VC?
- How many cities did you take with military?
- How many Dark Ages and/or Golden Ages did you have? Did you have a strategy?
- What effect did Loyalty have on your settling or conquering? How did you mitigate its effects?
- Any surprises 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.

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.

 

[unaghy]

T212 - RV / SCORE 768

I´ve decided to go west, then settled on truffles.

Delayed explansion a lot by getting holy district in capital, but getting religion as second after first from Stonehenge.
Took Patheon Monuments to the gods, as belief Divine Inspiration and Mosque, then evangelized to Lay Ministry and Holy Order.
Fir governor including first 5 upgrades was Moksha for obvious reason.

Built 6 cities on coast. Couldnt have more as Cree was good in expansion. Then settled 4 cities on east continent in marginal locations.
Focused on Holy Sites, Harbors and later Theather districts.

Started with missionaries, later with Apostles. Too bad that I started too late withApostles, as Budhism has been re-established on core continent while I was converting the other one.

I had non-existing army, as I was able to befriend all except Norway due to non-existing navy. Funny enough, after I have retired great admiral into creation 1 ironclad, I was praised for strong navy
No surpise when I wrote that I took no cities by force, but one by loyalty flip. Loyalty had no effect in my gameplay.

Research was slow in favor of culture. I researched Astrology first, then it was more or less not important. On culture tree big focus was to get Theology. Suzerained few CS, kept only religious one for all times.

First I had normal age, then all were golden, where I took the one adding more religion spread charges.

I played first time after game came out for religion victory, so my performance was below my own expectation, however I´ve enjoyed game in the end.

Spoiler TURN 213 :

 

[Eyswein]

T81, Religious Victory

- How many cities did you settle, or capture? Ended with 7 cities
Settled 3 cities early (capital; T15 made a settler; T18 Pantheon Religious Settlements for a settler); settled 1 city via a captured settler
Captured 4 cities (3 capitals; 1 other to upgrade warriors to Tao – it rebelled); razed at least 5 cities

- What did you prioritize for research and culture?
Science: AH (find horses), Pottery, Irrigation, Astronomy (Holy Sites), headed to Construction (Toa)
Culture: prioritized Mil Trad (faster horses & combat adjacency bonus), then Pol Phil (for Oligarchy with +4 melee units)

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Navy: None; Army: 1 slinger, warriors, horsemen, upgrade some warrior to Tao
Capital: Settler x2 (one via Pantheon), monument, builder (via gold), warriors
2nd city: slinger, then warriors; 3rd city: warriors
As soon as possible placed Holy Sites in 5 cities, but didn’t build them until military was advancing; actually had to hold off a couple turns on making my religion as I wanted the Holy Sites I was building completed so I wouldn’t have to convert any of my own cities to my religion

- Did you use your UU/UB? Were they useful?
Yes, used Tao; yes, needed as Macedonians already had their special unit after I took just one city

- What was your most useful unit?
Can’t think of any one in particular; all played a balanced role

- Was diplomacy useful? How?
Generally no as I was a warmonger and denounced by all; biggest use was getting Sweden to declare a joint war on Mali on the turn we met and then made peace with Mali as soon as I could

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Armagh as an early find for Pantheon and then for shrine faith bonus

- Did religion play a role in your game?
Well of course; T18 Pantheon for settler and T68 Religion was requirement to win

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Religious VC?
1) Find an initial city spot – since warrior found land to W on T1, settled that direction on T4
2) Explore nearby area & settle more cities
3) Had to keep first warrior and next few built near initial cities area due to barbarians
4) Find others; annoyingly 4 AI were closer to me when we met (due to item 3), so had to hard explore for their locations; one showed me a city; two of the three others exchanged capital info; didn’t find Sweden until T63
5) Attack others (Cree assimilated T51) and once I had one, spread religion to those I didn’t plan to take (had to escort religious units in some areas due to the barbarians); I ended up eliminating 3 AI and converting 4 AI

- How many cities did you take with military?
At least 9, but only kept 4 while razing all others

- How many Dark Ages and/or Golden Ages did you have? Did you have a strategy?
One Golden Age, Exodus of the Evangelicals

- What effect did Loyalty have on your settling or conquering? How did you mitigate its effects?
My second city settled near the Cree; initially focused on growth to offset loyalty issue; razed most cities, but that is because I didn’t want to have to convert any extra cities to my religion, not due to loyalty concerns; on the one city I didn’t raze, just let it rebel

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
I didn’t expect Macedonia UU out so early, so ended up converting them via Religion

- Did you enjoy your game?
Absolutely - I love Domination; Religion played this way is very similar to Domination with an extra tool

 

[gcampono]

RV turn 102

How many cities did you settle, or capture?
I founded 7 cities (2 late on the other continent) and captured 7 (macedon, mali), but lost 2 because of loyalty.

- What did you prioritize for research and culture?
Science: prioritized horses (for wiping out macedon) then holy sites
Culture: prioritized the one that gave 2x faith adjacency

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Navy: None; Army: 3 warriors, 3 archers, 4 horsemen (then upgraded)

- Did you use your UU/UB? Were they useful?
Maybe upgraded one Tao at the end. Did not really make use of them.

- What was your most useful unit?
Apostles.

- Was diplomacy useful? How?
Not really, I waged war on 3 cifs and was denounced by all and even got a joint war declared against me (Cree and Norway).

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Yes, Fez generated an insane amount of science (which was useless for this game). I discovered Armagh too late.

- Did religion play a role in your game?
Of course. RV

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Religious VC?
I went on the left and settled, then discovered Macedon was near. Did a detour to domination to wipe them out, then I spammed holy sites everywhere. Took the religion for extra culture and 30% discount. I probably should have focused on religion only and not war.

- How many Dark Ages and/or Golden Ages did you have? Did you have a strategy?
One Golden Age, Exodus of the Evangelicals

- What effect did Loyalty have on your settling or conquering? How did you mitigate its effects?
Lost two cities (sweden).

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
I didn't expect a joint war against me. Did no damage, but I lost some turns. I also didn't expect one civ to develop a religion after I almost converted it all... I had to redo some work.

- Did you enjoy your game?
A little bit too easy. I prefer Deity.

 

[isopaha]

RV 150. I like to take the unorthodox route with Kupe, so I went east with my settler and settled very close to Mali, who I took out quite early. After that Norway and Macedon DoWed me and I took my army south to Macedon. I left only one city for Macedon, my army was quite superior. After that I was lazy to continue any warring, so I settled 2 cities on the other continent as well.

However, Norway had been struggling with barbarians in his capital the whole game and it was very low hp, so I took it out with one galley and kept it for the rest of the game. I bought one Toa there and he took care of the barbarians.

I focused on one early holy site, lots of TS for faith. Probably with slightly better planning with apostles etc. could have shaved off about 20 turns.

 

[Casualty of war]

I don't think I amend my settling decisions for Kupe properly; you can't chop your way out of a low Hammer spot with him. And Holy Sites can take forever if you don't have Hammers. I wish my Il-Kil sense had tingled, but instead I headed toward the Chocolate Hills for my initial city.

I waited to found my religion until fairly late so that I could have Holy Sites built on both continents and in almost all my cities. That gave Sweden too much time to spread their religion all over the place.

An early war to acquire Cree's Campuses turned into a costly grind. I built very few Settlers because there were Barb-swiped Settlers everywhere!; Norway may have lost 3 to Barbs then to me.

Super durdly game. I feel like I lost the plot.

 

[kcd_swede]

RV t117 score 382

I went East, so a bigly different game than the others. I settled on the coast with seafood etc. Too close to Alexander to do anything other than immediately go to military mode and take over Pella with slingers. No more real wars after that.

My pantheon belief was Relics, because I found one in turn 2 or 3. I was slow getting to Theology - or whatever lets you make temples, so that was a strategic miss. My religion took 30% cheaper apostles as its first belief, then Mosques, and finally +2 faith for each foreign city with the religion. I got the extra promo from the governor, and 2 free apostles from a wonder. +2 spreads with golden age... I had some apostles with 9 spreads, triple strength. It was just a pain getting to the other continent.

My goal was less than 100 turns, and I would have done it if there was not such bad timing in the founding of religion #3 and religion #4. (I won before there was a religion #5).

I think I could have easily gotten under 100 turns if only I had gotten to temples sooner - but the need for a quick kill on Alexander distracted me, then had to catch up in tech/civics rates... and well... one thing leads to another.

A lot of fun playing these quicker games. I mean, the outcome is usually certain by t100 in most games, then just a slog. So I enjoyed it a lot.

 

[arthur486]

RV @ Turn 85 (personal record)

How many cities did you settle, or capture?
Settled 5 cities, and played a totally peaceful game.

What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Astrology for holy sites, bronze working for chops, PP for classical republic and Theology for Mahabodhi Temple. The rest did not make any difference.

What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
I did create around 6 warriors and used them to scout the land ahead of my missionaries, to make sure they are not captured by barbarians. Did not have a navy at all, as with the stronger warriors it was not needed.

Did you use your UU/UB? Were they useful?
Did not even get to construction, would have been useless in this attempt.

What was your most useful unit?
Missionaries that converted all required cities.

Was diplomacy useful? How?
Tried to make friends with everyone, to make sure they did not declare war and kill my missionaries. This was successful, as no one declared on me.

Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Armagh was very useful, managed to build a few monasteries with +3 faith.

Did religion play a role in your game?
Yes, I established it as quickly as I could.

What was your strategy, how did you gain your Religious VC?
I thought 5 cities to be enough on Prince, but now I think 4, or even 3 well-placed cities are enough for a quick victory (might give it another go and report back). Idea was to build HS, have 3 envoys in religious city states and convert everyone with Exodus of the Evangelists missionaries. After HS were done I switched to builders and chopped forests and rainforests for holy site prayers. At the end, I had ~100 faith/turn.

How many cities did you take with military?
None, played peacefully. I thought a military approach would actually slow this game, as only Kristina and the Cree managed to start a religion.

How many Dark Ages and/or Golden Ages did you have? Did you have a strategy?
Classical Golden Age (T59) for Exodus of the Evangelists.

Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
Yes, I am actually surprised that @Eyswein beat me using a military approach. Some things that I missed, or could be improved during a replay:

• I started moving the settler in the other direction, but without map info getting this right is difficult.
• I converted Macedon, and then Alexander founded a new city causing them to be unconverted, so I lost a few turns to get a new missionary there. Have to pay attention to this!
• Getting to Kristina was difficult, as she was farthest away. Of course this is still relative, as T85 is still kind of early.
• Mahabodhi Temple was a waste, as the AI had no missionaries to kill. Maybe chopping earlier would have been better!?

Did you enjoy your game?
Very much. Might replay it to improve my finish time and report back, as it all went very quickly. Thank you 6otM team!

 

[Casualty of war]

I don't think I amend my settling decisions for Kupe properly; you can't chop your way out of a low Hammer spot with him. And Holy Sites can take forever if you don't have Hammers. I wish my Il-Kil sense had tingled, but instead I headed toward the Chocolate Hills for my initial city.

I waited to found my religion until fairly late so that I could have Holy Sites built on both continents and in almost all my cities. That gave Sweden too much time to spread their religion all over the place.

An early war to acquire Cree's Campuses turned into a costly grind. I built very few Settlers because there were Barb-swiped Settlers everywhere!; Norway may have lost 3 to Barbs then to me.

Super durdly game. I feel like I lost the plot.

Well, I'm a moron (but you might have already noticed.) Somehow I got "Can't harvest" confused with "Can't chop", and built all my Holy Sites the hard way.

Might have to read that Civilopedia one of these days.

 

[Falabello]

Religious Victory - Turn 138

This game had a reloaded, but my fault ... And then, repeated all the movements in just one turn... Following the 6otM' rules

- Did you enjoy your game?
Yep! Thanks for one more game!

 

[MyFatDogCher]

Religious Victory - Turn 160

- How many cities did you settle, or capture? 15 - Cities. With a barbarian siege on Norway I was able to capture their only city.
- What did you prioritize for research and policies? Culture prioritized Reformed Church. No science focus.
- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change? Minimal to respond to barbarians.
- Did you use your UU/UB? Were they useful? 2 upgraded, minimally useful to control barbarians.
- What was your most useful unit? Apostles, defeat & convert.
- Was diplomacy useful? How? Yes, kept out of war to avoid having to build units.
- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states? Yes, Housing/faith from Armagh, and Amenities from Cahokia.
- Did religion play a role in your game? Victory type.
- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Religious VC? Divine inspiration with Mosques,(extra spread), Holy Order (30% cheaper), Lay Ministries (extra culture/faith). Upgraded religion with Exodus of the evangelist golden age gave my units 2 extra spreads. With Religious I always try to wait until Theology to start Sending out a first wave of apostles followed by a wave of missionaries. I also will create apostles in a city with an upgraded Moksha. My final turn I won after winning a religious emergency that converted the Cree before sent units that way.
- How many cities did you take with military? 1 - Walked right into Norway Capital after a barbarian siege.
- How many Dark Ages and/or Golden Ages did you have? Did you have a strategy? 2 Golden Ages, Exodus of the evangelist helped speed up victory.
- What effect did Loyalty have on your settling or conquering? How did you mitigate its effects? N/A.
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it? Low production, slow building of districts.
- Did you enjoy your game? Yes, would have sent out religious units sooner, but tried to stick to my plan.

 

[Vlad Dracula]

I gave up after settling next to Alex and being plagued by barbarians.I had no room to expand and the barbs were going ham.Kupe is a tricky guy to play.If you don't sail to a good spot you're pretty much hosed.

 

[kcd_swede]

I gave up after settling next to Alex and being plagued by barbarians.I had no room to expand and the barbs were going ham.Kupe is a tricky guy to play.If you don't sail to a good spot you're pretty much hosed.

I also thought it was a bit too random. Maybe the mapmaker needs to reveal the nearest shore tiles to make it a decision instead of just luck?

 

[Tarry]

Religion Victory. Score: 522 Turn: 146

Sailed West, which it looks like most other did.

- How many cities did you settle, or capture?
Settled 7 cities.
Captured Buenos Aeres.

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Astrology. Archery. Bronze Working. Then whatever seemed to be needed for my empire.
Early Empire. Political Philosophy. Theology. Reformed Church.

- What did you build for an Army and Navy and how did it change?
Built a couple of warriors, only 1 archer all aimed at dissuading a neighbour from attacking and dealing with barbs.
then a couple more warriors to aim to get Toa. A Quadreme to make Norway happy with my navy.
While I had horses I just sold them to anyone who wanted them, I probably should have made way more cav units.

- Did you use your UU/UB? Were they useful?
My Toa were the tip of the spear on my one war to capture Buenos Areas.
I never built the Marae, or even any theatres at all.

- What was your most useful unit?
Apostles and Missionaries. They won the world for me.

- Was diplomacy useful? How?
I was peaceful, selling some luxuries and making friends with everyone as best I could.

- Were City-States helpful? Did any other civ give you a hard time about city-states?
Buenos Ares was initially useful, but Gengis took them with his envoys, I couldn't shake free enough envoys to recapture it, so I sent my military to capture it in the sole military actiion in my entire history.
Armagh but only for the bonus faith production, I don't think I built a single monastry.
Fez was EXCELLENT as my wave of converters spread out, Fez gave me so much science I completed many science research items.

- Did religion play a role in your game?
um... yes? That was the victory condition.
With Choral Music (no need for theatres) and Holy Orders (cheep is king), then later Pilgramages my religion really rocketed as it spread further and further. My religions units were excellent explorers, though there were many barbarians that my guys fled from.

- What was your strategy, how did you gain your Religious VC?
I build holy sites as my 1st zones in cities to produce faith even though the sites were generally rubbish with little adjacency. I sent out my Apostles and Missionaries to convert the Cree first, got them while they were weak and took their holy city very quickly.

Norway were converted, but then they got the penultimate prophet who established their religion overthrowing mine on 2/3 of their cities. A couple of dead norway missionaries later they all came back to the fold and their heresies were forgotten as a minor note in the annals of time. There was an emergency from that, but well, nothing happened. Norway had no religious units or cities to generate any with the did Cree. Sweden was too far away to get anyone there in time.

Sweden was the first Religious power taking the Settler forcing me to go for divine spark - which did help get an early prophet. Annoying though. Sweden on the other continent really spread their religion quickly, but I think had run out of steam with the rising costs of missionaries and apostles when my team arrived who except for one religious fight converted everyone the hard way.

- How many cities did you take with military?
1. Buenos Ares.

- How many Dark Ages and/or Golden Ages did you have? Did you have a strategy?
All Golden. Exodus of the Evangelists for the movement and extra charges.

- What effect did Loyalty have on your settling or conquering? How did you mitigate its effects?
It stopped me spreading out any further, but there was never any danger of losing anything that was mine.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
The AI on price is really slow at doing things, it's not grabby for wonders at all.

- Did you enjoy your game?
It was a walk over, a bit to easy, a nice gentle win. I settled in a mediocre location and grew only slowly.

 

[tarafran]

RV 87
settled 3 cities and only build monuments faith districts/shrine/temple some warriors and builders and spammed missionaries.
peaceful
I got lucky with Mali as his GP was afraid to get out due to the barbarian camp next to his cap (see pix)
the only other religion was Sweden
Great game
thanks

 

[Minou]

T87 RV

Thought I had a chance at the fastest time but I see several people pulled off quicker victories, very impressive!

Opening

I sent the Warrior west and spotting land moved the Settler west too. The biggest decision I made all game was to spend a few turns looking for a better starting spot. I ultimately settled directly on the Tobacco on T8, figuring it was worth a couple turns to have a better chance at Religious Settlements. One AI beat me to the first Pantheon but took Earth Goddess, so I got the free Settler on T22. Seeing Galapagos nearby I decided on a hybrid Toa / Missionary strategy and settled my second city where it could buy and work the 4 science tile. Used the first three Governor titles to promote Pingula three times and then Amani to get Suzerain of Valetta for vision on the other continent.

My starting Warrior eventually discovered the other continent and made the most importamt play of the game. I declared on Sweden T43 just to pilllage a Holy Site for some extra faith and to slow them down from getting a religion. On T46 they marched an unescorted Settler right up to my Warrior and I grabbed it allowing me to found Kapiti, which evenutally built a Holy Site and then served as a great base for Missionary buys one turn walking distace fron Sweden.

Spoiler :

Not sure waiting 3-4 extra turns to settle on the Tobacco helped or hurt in the long run. I was not sure how fast AIs would grab Religious Settlements on Prince....

What AI logic says that this Settler leaving a city to move to a tile next to both my Warrior and a barbarian unit, and not cover it with the Swedish Warrior is a valid choice?

Military Front

Built a few Warriors and a Horseman to take out the Cree plus a Slinger to boost Archery and a few Builders to chop and make improvements to boost techs like Masonry and HBR on the path to Construction. I wiped out Cree quikjly with 2 Oligarchy Warriors and 1 Horseman (cities captured T50, T5 and T59). Hit Construction on T56 - I think this is the only time I have ever gotten the Games and Recreation boost by teching Construction first - and upgraded a few Toa to take out Norway. They were eliminated on T74 in a nailbiter final attack by my last local Toa with only 17HP left. India looked like they might be a harder nut to crack, but they moved their one Varu west for some random reason and I sacked their only city before they could move them back inside on T84. At this point I realized I made a mistake not razing any cities since capturing the Indian capital gave me 4 converted cities and 5 unconverted cities. Lucily I was able to convert one more of my own the same turn as I converted Sweden so it did not cost me any turns.

Spoiler :

Sure wish those Mekewaps were Pastures or Mines....

I assume that Varu was clearing a barb camp or something, but moving it so far west spelled doom for India!

Religious Front

Got the relic Booth of Toth from a hut T60 and secured the first Religion T73 with Reliquaries and Missionary Zeal, which was amazingly good with all the hilly land. I estimate taking Zeal instead of Holy Orders saved ~5 turns. I actually delayed using the Great Prophet about a dozen turns to get the overseas Holy Site up first for the free spread. Got a Exodus Golden Age T59. Two Missionaries set sail T74 and converted Mali and Macedonia. Mali actually got a Great Prophet but for some reason never founded a Religion - not sure why but it certainly made things easier. At home I converted Mongolia with three charges and then sent the Missionary back to recovert one of the captured Cree cities once I realized my mistake with keeping too many atheist cities. Sweden was theonly AI to found a religion and they had 3 Missionaries out at one point. Luckily they all wandered off after converting the three Swedish cities and I was able to rapidly convert them to my religion with Missionaries from Kapiti. My Missionaries from Mali and Macedonia headed over to help but the long mountain chains delayed both of them so badly they never made it in time.

Spoiler :

Kapiti was amazingly useful. I had to fight with Governor + Monument to keep it from flipping due to Loyalty but once it hit 2 pop it stabilized. Being able to build Missionaries right next to Sweden was huge.

Thoughts

In retrospect I wonder if just 3-4 cities and Missionaries would have been faster than war? Honestly I had no idea what to build in my cities after Holy City and Shrine so I don’t imagine investing in troops hurt especially since faith for Missionaries was in short supply.

The biggest wrench in my plans was that I only found 1 faith-yielding tile to pillage the whole game which meant I had to reky on chopped Holy Sites, Scripture, and Shrines (hard-built since I had no gold from pillage either) to buy Missionaries. If my neighbors had three or four Plantations/Pastures it would have been a huge help! Man, I HATE Mekewaps - the AI spammed so many of them while all those Salt and Tobacco tiles sat unimproved.

 

[FeiLing]

RV turn 90

Sailed West and found Gobustan and the CS there, settled a bit more top next to two bananas.
Declared early on the Cree to steal a settler and also on Norway to prevent them from being able to use a great prophet (which they were close to spawn one at the end).

Spoiler :

Settled the 3rd (or 4th?) city on the other continent. It was very close to flipping, especially since one can't harvest resources, but I could stabilize finally.
The Missionaries bought from there (and the pressure from the city+govenor) probably saved quite a bit of time.

Spoiler :

Converted both the Cree and Sweden (who had the only other Religion due to Stonehenge) on the last turn.

Spoiler :

Surprised my finishing turn seems to be quite good; expected to be in the midfield as usual especially since I made quite a few mistakes imho.
Also surprised that people seemed to favor religious settlements as pantheon when for me the choice obviously had to be Sacred Path (Holy
Site districts get +1 Faith from adjacent Rainforest tiles). Took Reliquaries since I found a Relic - so the +8 faith probably were the best choice.

Didn't manage to finish a temple, so only bought Missionaries. Not even sure if I should have build shrines in the other cities
(other than the cap and the city on the other continent). Probably straight up just Holy Site projects would have been better.

Had one nice trade route from my cap to Malis cap for 12 gpt. Interestingly a trade route to his other city, which also went through Niani would have only gotten 6 gpt
Glad we were Kupe and didn't have to wait for the tech to travel ocean tiles... would have made the game take much longer for no real reason.

.

 

[leif erikson]

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