[BTS] A proud history of failed Deity games?

[drewisfat]

Then again i doubt it's difficult to create really unwinnable maps where none of that helps.

Then why has it not been done yet! I'm always down for a masochist series
Would want normal settings/script and no human editing.

 

[Pangaea]

Sury game up to Writing T68.

Spoiler :

Definitely a very good starting area! Some nasty AIs though, and they started encroaching on the locations I wanted, including Darius in the west. I've REXed pretty hard, possibly too much, but felt like I had to get out some settlers to claim what I could before the rest of the tiles around the capital would be lost too. I did go Archery because things looked overly dicey just before turn 40, figuring we'd have enough commerce here to make up for it, and it's nice to have if you get invaded. That never happened here, and then AIs got more units and cities about, and helped kill off barbs. Just found a city in the west, but I won't get that one. Probably Darius or Willem. Darius got Alpha a few turns ago. Suppose Aesthetics is the safest route, so I've picked that for now. But with 6 cities so early, I'll need to save money for a while before we can turn on research. Want to get up a few libraries too. They are nice 2-pops with CRE. A scoutboat is out, and working on another one. Can possibly pick up Sailing on my own before going in for Aesthetics again, but we'll see. Can't really afford more cities right now anyway, and got foreign trade routes anyway (roaded to Darius, but got them with Bismarck when we opened borders this turn).

Going back to the start, first thing I did was send the scout to the forested hill SW. He saw corn, which I wanted, and there was a PH nearby, so I went there. Turn out there was corn with SIP too, but I didn't know about that (and can't get both anyway). Amazingly I didn't think about this, but settling like this meant a 10-turn worker. Could barely get out Agri in time!

Wanted to settle the west much earlier, but unfortunately this barb archer killed my first warrior, and that was a huge setback. He had just checked for fish, and when he came back.. well...

Due to that, I settled directly north of the capital, because it was a reasonably safe area without any fogbusters (scout was camped in the forest/jungle west/SW). Darius had his own ideas, and nothing I could do.

Means AH was less useful than it should have been, particularly considering we have horses nowhere in sight, but at least we have some cows that can be improved, and it does give a boost on Writing. I picked up Fishing too, for a fish in the NE, and the ability to send out exploreboats.

This area I had already given up getting, and it's not that great anyway, and it's a contest between Bismarck and Napoleon. Looks like Napoleon will get it.

That's the only archer I made btw, but it was nice to have one in that area, in case something bad was incoming. Which brings me to the current situation in T68. We have six cities, six workers and Writing. Cities are on the small side due to whips, but the gold is online now so then the capital can grow to 6. And as you can see, two more workers come out next turn. That should be okay I think. 8 for 6 cities. More than I usually have, but need much cottaging here. Not so much more chopping, as most forests have been cut down already. For now I have traded away copper so I could make a few more warriors, but I'll cancel that deal when I can probably.

Whether I can get into a reasonably good position is another question, but it does help with a map that is probably well above average

 

[Fippy]

Sure Drew..with or without picked AIs?

 

[Qactus]

@Pangaea

Spoiler :

Glad you played it, despite seeming to be put off somewhat by the mapscript. I think with everybody on the same landmass it plays like a Pangaea here, with the option to settle some of the islands.

I recommended the map because
- it allowed me to settle wonderful food-rich cities that were all connected w/o requiring Wheel nor Sailing, just with rivers/coast and CRE borders.
- the AI were present enough to help reduce barb threats, yet far enough to not contest the most important spots.

It turns out we settled the same spots, only your first one I don't get. The barb archer of course threatened the NW, but wasn't the NE spot available? That was my first one, and with corn and wheat it did a lot of the 4->2 whipping, later with fish giving the wheat to copper city. It also allowed me to secure one additional nice spot further east towards America.

I had one save turn 61 which can offer some comparison. I went Agri-BW-TW-Pot-Fish-Sailing. Skipping AH and Archery was better I think (earlier cheap granaries and cottages), but sailing was a mistake that cost me. I was getting greedy and despite seeing Bismarck on the map I thought I could grab the Great Lighthouse (I'm still not familiar with Deity wonderdates)
He finished the wonder in BC1760 Without Sailing and also Fishing I could've gone Writing so much earlier for those CRE Libraries instead. Then try to grab the Lighthouse (and who knows, maybe even Mids then) from Bismarck with a beelined construction or engineering rush...

Spoiler T61 pictures :

 

[Pangaea]

@Qactus

Spoiler :

Yes, it's a very nice map so glad I tried it out. Interesting that we settled the same spots, and very nice that you managed to grab that corn location SE of copper. Lincoln got that in my game, and Bismarck REXed really hard it seems, grabbing what turned out to be iron just west of my own capital. That could really be a problem, because I haven't found any other iron within reach. As for that first city, I built the settler at size 2, so when the warrior died, I had zero military units. Hadn't even uncovered the coast in the NE, and scouted with the worker slightly north of the capital to see if there was fish I might orphan. It therefore felt like the only option I had. It turned into a fine enough city, but naturally it wasn't a strong one for city #2. Maybe if that warrior hadn't died, I could have avoided Archery altogether, and gotten an even faster start.

Think we picked the same techs in the same sequence (no, except AH and archery). So I ended up postponing Writing perhaps longer than I should have. But I wanted to get out some workboats, for the fish and to explore. Too late, and barb galleys will eat them all.

Anyway, I've played up to T100, and the game has gone well. Oddly enough I haven't picked a religious side yet, because there are dangers in both. I'll annoy either Napoleon or Bismarck. Pretty sure I'll go with Confu though, but redoing the Copper deal to pick up another happy resource could really bite me in the neck, because I turned down a stop-trading demand from Napoleon earlier... he may not look too kindly on that sort of behaviour.

In turn 100 we have 10 cities, which feels like a lot, but the economy hasn't buckled over yet due to the great land and double golds. Only one GS, which built an Academy. Will win the Music race next turn, and completed a +10 pop HG this turn. It's why I needed that extra happy. Probably best to wait with a GAge until later, need CoL first, but was still thinking of going HR+OR now, and going Confucianism. It has been reasonably well-spread, and three other AIs have it. Hammurabi Oracled it pretty early, and I love it when something else than Buddhism/Hinduism (even Judaism) becomes a big religion.

A few screenshots

Spoiler :

Feels very weird to be on top of the scoreboard, but of course it's due to HG. Once I whip a bit it'll change.

Wonders went a little later in my game it seems, except Stonehenge early.

The AIs have felt kinda slow, but maybe this is more normal? A while until 1AD still, but so far we're holding up okay in the tech department. Darius is doing very well (hello GLH) with Feudalism and soon Buro/CS.

It doesn't show above, but I've settled some islands, including on top of stone a little bit west. That's why I was able to build HG, and also got some failgold out of Pyramids (two chops + one whip OF). Looks like there are many other good locations too, but without GLH it's not as easy to go on a settling spree. Haven't explored all the islands to our north yet, but I see there are some icy lands that a galley is trying to uncover. I hope there is iron up there, otherwise I may not be able to get it. Since we don't have horses either...

 

[Qactus]

That is looking great! Well, technically you could steal Iron next turn with a Culture Bomb in Angkor Wat, right? But compared to what a golden age will bring that would be a waste probably...
Interesting that Darius got the GLH and Mids in your game and not Bismarck. Makes him target no1 probably, the question would be when and with what. Definitely do keep exploring the islands in any case!

 

[Pangaea]

That is looking great! Well, technically you could steal Iron next turn with a Culture Bomb in Angkor Wat, right? But compared to what a golden age will bring that would be a waste probably...
Interesting that Darius got the GLH and Mids in your game and not Bismarck. Makes him target no1 probably, the question would be when and with what. Definitely do keep exploring the islands in any case!

Perhaps this is a weakness of mine, but in games like this I tend to get into the habit of trying to improve the economy, expand the empire peacefully, explore the land, etc, and not go into a frame of mind where I need to declare war on the nearest neighbour. But that is also due to many bad experiences with trying that on Deity early in the game. It is quite literally a "do or die" situation, because if you fail there is no coming back (although we typically don't play out games that 'fail'). Like in that war on Ragnar that essentially got nowhere. So in my experience, waging war with catapults and up to trebs is very risky and costly. Which is hard to bear with a small empire. So unless I can rush quite early on, I tend to sit back and hope for an opportunity later. That is likely what will occur here too. Hopefully I can then strike with Cuirs or cannons or suchlike much later in the game. Or the AIs get totally out of control again, and I lose the will to keep breathing. Aaaah :|

 

[drewisfat]

Sure Drew..with or without picked AIs?

Sure you can pick human/AI civs. We probably disagree on who the worst human civ is though
Probably more interesting if you weren't isolated but you're probably right that simply bad isolation vs techers is the hardest.

I've also envisioned an AI getting GLH + ridiculous natural coastline as a possible nightmare to contend with.

@Pangaea Big part of pangaea maps is that they're small, that's why catapults or HAs are typically required. With 10 cities there's 0 pressure to attack before lib. In my book music usually means cuirs, but am I seeing correctly that you have neither horse nor iron?

 

[Fippy]

I don't dislike IMP, but with Charly it's more his starting techs which make coastal starts really really bad.
Who do you consider most difficult, Sally? Eventually his starting techs are even worse despite having an expensive one with wheel, no route to AH either.

I was thinking about that, bad Iso can be boring but yup it's the most awkward situation.
Depends on what we want, worst or with some options at least..your call

 

[drewisfat]

That's fair. I usually don't consider starting techs, since I think they're basically a wash that depends on the map. But given that we're handpicking a bad map, they should certainly be considered. Otherwise Hammurabi is overall worst for me. Worst 2 traits, anti-synergy between UU and AGG, and starting techs that lead to neither. Admittedly, that probably doesn't hold up here because rushing pottery out before BW actually makes sense when isolated. I think the goal should remain: generating an unwinnable map with normal settings even granting full knowledge / multiple attempts.

 

[Fippy]

Didn't quiet find that one horrible map today which i saw sometimes in the past, but this one looks masochist for sure

Picked Monty for something different, and selected one AI (Mansa) but others are random.
Not judging unbeatable here, but i certainly remember how those usually play out.

On one roll i was sad how a gold mine ruined an otherwise beautifully terrible start which wasn't even Iso, oh well.

 

[Pangaea]

Aah, this game, huh? Is this one of those "accept or we DOW you" cases? Anyway, looks like my preference of Confucianism went out the window and I ought to do this for my own safety. Then hope the others don't declare soon either.

Spoiler :

Hopefully we can eventually find a suitably small island for Napoleon to spend his days

 

[Pangaea]

More about the Sury game, close to 1AD (yeah, I play slooooowwww)

Spoiler :

Very glad to have found iron up in the icesheet, which will be settled in two turns unless a barb galley comes out of the shadows and screws us over. Otherwise the AIs have been expanding more and more to their islands. Napoleon has most cities currently at 12, but he's a little backwards. Darius looks the most dangerous. Just got Paper and could have gone Edu->Lib, but went Nationalism. Looks difficult to beat him to Lib, but it may be possible depending on what he does. But the key is to actually get something good, not necessarily just get there first. And without horses, I'm probably looking at cannons here.

However, might it also be possible to try something with maces and trebs? A ways to Engineering still, but we have gold.

Bismarck demanded 100g or war, which I accepted -- and then got it back with Drama. Darius has picked a great lot of wonders: GLH, Pyramids (yet stays despotic for some genius reason), Colossus, Great Library and now AP (Confu). Last two just a turn apart, so he must have gotten a GE. I had to give away stone to get ivory (mainly for happiness as we still lack construction and HBR), but have recently hooked up marble.

In short, what would you guys do there? Perhaps in particular directed at @Qactus who has presumably played to a win here.

Some screens.

Spoiler :

The core of the empire, with a size 15 capital.

They seem a little slow so far, which has greatly surprised me. Darius and Hammurabi are doing rather well, though, helped by big shrines.

I've selected Paper, but was also thinking about going Machinery with the aim of an Engineering/Trebs war. That may just go to hell again tho, so not sure I should try that.

A little envious of Darius' wonders.

 

[Qactus]

@Pangaea

Spoiler :

No, I didn't play that much further actually, but now I'm really tempted to pick it up again. Deity games that go well are still rare uncharted territory for me, so what usually happens then is I become more and more careful with decisions up to a point where "stepping back to think about it" eventually becomes "stop playing completely"
I'll post it this evening when I'm back home, think now that you found iron island there's no relevant spoilers to avoid anymore. Lots of differences, mainly because I settled marble and you stone and because it appears you did a much better job at tech trading.

 

[sampsa]

@Pangaea

Spoiler :

To me, the position seems won. You should go cuirs, since you have music and can get horsie from Lincoln soon. I'd focus more on growing and less on failgolding and infra (prob no point in starting forges anymore) to get the max benefit from the upcoming GA.

 

[Qactus]

@Pangaea

Spoiler :

Turns out I was only two turns ahead. There were three decisions to be made that turn, that's why I had stopped at that point: 1) Give away Paper or not for Metal Casting, which became available. 2) whip MoM for 3 pop or slow build for another 3 turns (I really want it) 3) Figure out how to best trade for Hammurabi's Ivory

When I compare with your game, there's only one mistake that really bothers me (because it is not the first time I forget): Going Music directly after Literature instead of Drama first which almost pays for itself with the discount it grants.
The other things are more connected with me not being used to deity timings. For example I see you were much faster with tile improvements and used more workers. I was completely surprised by how fast everybody supplied Calendar ressources and was not prepared for the sudden jump in happy cap when I turned my crab monopoly into an assortment of dyes, sugar, silk, etc. So I really scrambled to get more cottages laid down to avoid working unimproved tiles.

I think both of our games are probably made for Cuirs. Horses should become available at some point as sampsa said.

Regarding tech choices and trading I like your Civil Service much better with the awesome Cap we have. But when I play on deity I always feel I have to make extreme beelines and backfill as much as possible. So I waited for CoL an eternity (still waiting btw) instead of just self-teching it.
Without CoL I also waited with civic switches (have only made the slavery switch).
So now I feel I'm missing out on waay too much of the good stuff (Caste, Paci, Buero) while I sit there with Paper and Edu which are on the right path but have no immediate use at all.

Regarding great people, I built one academy, put one bulb into Education and the Artist is waiting for MoM. National Epic is in the NE food city and Great Library in the SE one which had the forests to build it. Would've been nice to combine these two, but NE didn't have the production.

Bismarck and Napoleon are at war and Hammurabi built the Hindu AP, which is nice since it's the religion I was going for as well when the golden age starts.

Also, circumnavigation looked so easy on this map, but it is not!

Spoiler Screenshots :

 

[Pangaea]

@Qactus

Spoiler :

Looking very good! Dang! Teching Gunpowder before 1AD is nuts

You have beelined pretty hard for that I see, and not gone HR+OR yet. Ofc you have better bearings on this save than I do, just taking a peek like this, but think I'd self-tech CoL myself at this point. You get "poor" value with Darius when trading Theo+Music for Feudalism, which means he is teching one of those himself, probably Theo. I wouldn't want to give away Paper monopoly at this point. Doesn't seem like there is a need. Looks like only Darius has CS, so you're unlikely to get a trade for that I think in the near future. Many AIs lack CoL currently, and it's ofc possibly they are working on CS via the Feudalism route, but I wouldn't bank on it. But if you do that trade, you get +40% on CS from having both pre-reqs, which make it quite cheap.

MC is certainly nice, but maybe not urgent yet. Forges is something you typically need to whip anyway, so then it's nice to have the OR bonus. I wouldn't give away Paper monopoly for it.

It doesn't look like anybody are deep into a wonder build currently, and you probably have view on most relevant cities by now, so it looks safe to avoid the MoM whip.

Perhaps you deem this too early, but considering you already have Edu and therefore don't need bulbs into that line, what about launching a golden age in three turns, when MoM is complete? You won't have Philo right off the bat, but you can then go into OR+Caste (by self-teching CoL now). Hopefully you get a GS from the NE city (very nice so early!), which can then bulb Philo. Then you go into Buro+Philo at the first possibility. Perhaps five turns is enough when research is boosted by a golden age. Otherwise you should have some leeway with MoM to do another civics switch during the GA and still change at the end of it if you wish. Hinduism is already spread in many cities, including the fairly big Bantaey Kdei (size 9 in three turns), so you can work a bunch of specialists there too. NE city will be size 10, maybe even 11 (if you work more food now). Since you don't have that city I had north of the capital, NE city has more food in your game.

Also great that you managed to secure the wine+sheep spot. That one got lost fairly early in my game, or maybe it was the barb problems that caused me the delay.

Looks like you've gone with bare minimum of roads, but presumably due to the challenge of keeping up with city growth as you mentioned. I kinda ran out of things for them to do, so I've roaded a whole ton.

The game looks in a very solid position As long as you avoid grabbing Machinery, it's still possible to bulb into Liberalism after Philo bulb plus some more techs, and with the GS you will get from a GA, that can come in handy. After that you can go Nationalism, and with MoM in hand and marble, you have a pretty good chance to get Taj I think. As always it depends a bit on what these other jokers do, as Darius can already tech Nationalism.

Spoiler :

I've not looked very closely on the resource trading, and you probably don't want to trade away marble. Otherwise that would be an option. The AIs value it highly when more wonders are available.

 

[konata_LS]

but in games like this I tend to get into the habit of trying to improve the economy, expand the empire peacefully, explore the land, etc, and not go into a frame of mind where I need to declare war on the nearest neighbour.

Nothing wrong in sticking to one's preference or habits. When challenging a new difficulty level, people certainly want to avoid things they are not used to do.

If you want a peaceful early game at Deity, NC 282 is worth trying. Strong starting techs + solid leader.

Spoiler :

Peaceful neighbours and nice land. More than one person managed to peacefully build 10+ cities at Deity on that map.

 

[Qactus]

@Pangaea

Spoiler :

Thanks so much for the detailed feedback! I really appreciate the time and thought you put into it. Self-teching CoL now and starting the GA immediately after MoM is a good plan I agree, with a Paci switch hopefully together with Buero possible during the same GA. Also thanks for pointing out the effect of getting Feudalism, I would have forgotten the discount here, as happened here with Drama&Lit.
In your game, I think Darius is really tempting to invade with so many of the best wonders concentrated in Persepolis. And it's one hell of a city on top of that. But going to war with anything before Cuirs is too risky probably. Then again with that big stack of cash to burn through, Engi could be reached quite quickly I suppose...

edit:

Spoiler 300AD :

Did the techs and trades as advised and it worked like a charm.
GP generation really took off with GA+Paci+NE+Parthenon: one GS bulbed into Lib, one spare GS already born (for Printing Press probably?) and hopefully two merchants next up.
Lincoln had his horse available for trade but I held back marble for Taj (have to tech Gunpowder first anyway). Didn't think he would switch out of Hinduism and into Islam, so now I have to get him back to pleased again to get the horse trade. As a last resort gifting Paper should do the trick though with the bonus for sharing a monopoly tech

 

[Henrik75]

Got another one that'll be on my channel soon, probably most brutal loss that will give me nightmares

Spoiler :

Napoleon Inland Sea attempt on deity!

Hannibal, starts plotting 1600BC, i click on him and he tells me he already has Numidian Cavalry Cautious, no border tension, barely even in sight too btw.

I have my points on him from the start because he's a good techer

At 1400BC I see he is 1 turn from construction, and I move my warrior in his border to discover he has ivory hooked up.

No signs of any stacks nearby so I let my guard down after stacking 4 archers on the border. He then starts going Metal casting -> Machinery -> Engineering immediately after at 1360BC.

Then a big stack of elephants, numids and catapults comes out of nowhere toward my direction. We finally got iron working and whip swords (to defend against catapults) and spears (to try to fight elephants + numids)

Around 500BC we get dowd by massive stack of elepults

He takes a couple cheap shots with random numid cavs and kills my spear and sword both at 20% odds or lower, before even bombarding. Of course!

City obviously gets crushed by elepults and strongest defenders being eliminated

He refuses to talk even though I have tech and garbage cities to gift him

He sends his numids out ahead to take everything within like 4 turns. A crushing defeat.