AI Survivor - AH Guessing Contest

[Thrasybulos]

Anyone else wants to have a guess? (@Keler ?)

 

[Keler]

Sure lets go

Spoiler wildcard :

1-Cyrus
2-Mao
3-Mehmed
4-Louis
5-Charlemgane
6-Brennus
7-Stalin
8-Churchill
9-Darius

Playoff 1

Spoiler po1 :

1-Mansa
2-Huayna
3-Victoria
4-Suryavarman
5-Pericles
6-Catherine

Playoff 2

Spoiler po2 :

1-Napoleon
2-Boudica
3-Ramesses
4-Justinian
5-Bismarck
6-Mao

Playoff 3

Spoiler po3 :

1-Gilgamesh
2-Sitting Bull
3-Cyrus
4-Alex
5-Tokugawa
6-Isabella

Final

Spoiler cs :

1-Huayna
2-Napoleon
3-Gilgamesh
4-Mansa
5-Boudica
6-Sitting Bull

 

[Thrasybulos]

So, you all got HC as the winner. Surprise, surprise.

You also all nailed Mansa, Nappy and Giggles in the Championship.
pen-dragon and Eauxps got Ramesses too.

Charlie escaped you all, but that was kinda tough to see that one coming, so good job all.

Eauxps and pen-dragon: 10 points.
Keler: 8 points.

 

[Eauxps I. Fourgott]

I'm pretty tickled that I managed to nail all of the Wildcard leaders' playoff finishes even though I didn't know who the leaders themselves were I guess that says a lot about the map dynamics for this set...

The actual results being sorted in a different order then the teasers here is highly frustrating when trying to compare all of my results piecemeal. Could that be fixed for future seasons? Just sort the final chart in the same way that you do the ones here.

 

[Thrasybulos]

The actual results being sorted in a different order then the teasers here is highly frustrating when trying to compare all of my results piecemeal. Could that be fixed for future seasons? Just sort the final chart in the same way that you do the ones here.

Sorry, I'll have to decline there.
I'm pretty happy with the Excel file as it is, restructuring it would be too much hassle. Same for manually copying the results to another file.

And anyway, I also have to perform that mental "gymnastics" when comparing my results with yours. Why don't you leave the leaders in their original order?

 

[Thrasybulos]

Next up: Season 7.

I have published my results for the Opening Round here.

For the final rounds, we get the following game composition:

Spoiler Wildcard Map :

Spoiler Playoff 1 Map :

Spoiler Playoff 2 Map :

Spoiler Playoff 3 Map :

The game results were:

So... who made it to the Championship game? And who was the Champion?

 

[a pen-dragon]

Spoiler Wildcard :

Kublai - Augustus - Boudica - Pacal - Liz - Roosevelt - Asoka - Alex - Nappy

Boudica Augustus and Kublai probably have the bets positions, about in that order. Now Boudica is terrible long term, and with a strong Augustus next to her I think she will be last amongst these. Between Kublai and Augustus probably Kublai has more kills, so I placed him first, but there is little difference between those.
The last two on this map are warmongers, leaving Alex and Nappy. Probably Alex does better by virtue of having more room.
Pacal will inevitably have conflicts with his neighbours, even if they have similar peaceweight. I think that he can kill them sometimes, thus I placed him fourth.
For the rest their records differ mostly by survival rate and I ordered the in descending distance from Kublai.

Spoiler Playoff 1 :

HC - Hanni - Isa - Hatty - Churchill - Qin

Now this is an econ game, since I do not see both Huayna and Hanni being eliminated in the same game frequently. HC seems to have more land than Hanni, and, well it is HC, so I will place him first. At the same time I can not see Hatty getting 15+ kills, so I will place her fourth due to her pobably being able to win culture from her position sometimes.
The problem with this interpretation is the I need a third AI that does about as well as Hanni. I do not think that either Qin or Churchill have what it takes to win such an econ game, so that leaves Isa. She will probably need a good war to win, but it is possible. The records of second and third are almost identical, but I think Hanni probably has better overall chances, even if they do not show on the scoring, so I will bet on him being second.
If both Isa and Hanni do well, then Qin does worse than Churchill.

Spoiler Playoff 2 :

Cyrus - De Gaulle - Augustus - Louis - Darius - Suleiman

On this map the De Gaulle and Cyrus have the strongest positions, by a good margin. De Gaulle may have better land, but he has less of it and is not as good at econ as Cyrus, thus Cyrus first, De Gaulle second. Also Cyrus has no early horses, thus he can not go Crazy with Immortals.
The third is either Augustus or Louis, since they probably will frequently fight. Augustus obviously has the upper hand inn an early war, due to Preatorians, but Louis has way more land and without Augustus he probably would do well, getting more than one win. Thus I think that an early war is more likely, meaning Augustus third, Louis fourth.
The worst leader on this map will probably be Suleiman, due to his bad land and proximity to Cyrus.

Spoiler Playoff 3 :

Justinian - Willem - Kublai - Gilga - Cathy - Shaka

Here we have three leaders that are good at war and econ (Justinian, Gilga, Kublai), one Shaka, Catherine and Willem. My first instinct is to put Willem down as low-scoreing, but since I do like playing him I will not. I rationalize this with hopeing that the others will be fighting each other with sufficient intensity to let him tech away. The second has a record that would match this.
Justinian is my favourite on this map, due to his position, even with Shaka, sinxce he does poorly.
Shaka will rarely see the end of this game, not with his neighbours, making him last. Justinian and Kublai are also sufficiently hard targets to justify his low kills.
A weak Shaka means land for Kublai, probably propelling him to third.
Catherine is just not good enough at econ to keep up with the rest without some conquest. The same is true for Gilga, but for different reasons, he is a better econ leader, but has less land. I think Gilga winning is more likely than Cathy.

Spoiler Championship :

Willem - HC - Hanni - Justinian - Cyrus - De Gaulle

Finally a set where the first does not appear to be HC. This really seems like a Willem in my eyes.
HC is still going to do well, but the so is Hanni. Hannibal will probably have more kills, thus I think he is third.
Justinian is a strong leader, but he does not have what it takes to frequently beat three financial leaders to the win.
That leaves Cyrus and De Gaulle, probably with Cyrus doing better.

 

[Keler]

Only hitting top 2 finishers matters in this contest

Spoiler wildcard :

Wildcard
1-Agustus, 7 wins
2-Kublai, 6 wins
rest I don't know, I don't care that much. Asoka must have at least once.

Spoiler po1 :

Playoff 1
1-Huayna Capac
2-Qin Shi Huang
3-Hannibal, my final answer. So close, almost tie
I think Isabella is the one with 2 wins.

Spoiler po2 :

Playoff 2
1-Louis XIV
2-De Gaulle
3-Cyrus, must be with 1 victory.
4 and 5 Kublai and Suleiman in whatever order
6-Darius

Spoiler po3 :

Playoff 3
1-Willem
2-Justin
3-Catherine
4-Shaka
5-Gilgamesh
6-Augustus

Spoiler championship :

Championship
1-Huayna Capac again
2-Justin
3-Louis
4-Qin
5-De gaul
6-Willem

 

[Thrasybulos]

So close, almost tie

Yes, that was almost unbelievable (they were exactly tied until game 18!), which unfortunately here makes it a pure lucky guess.
I use wins > survivals > kills as a tie-breaker for the same scores, but I never imagined I could have two top leaders exactly tied after 20 games!
If that had happened, I don't know how I would have settled it: random draw? Play a 21st game and use that result to break the tie? Use the live game result as the tie-breaker?

 

[Eauxps I. Fourgott]

Spoiler Wildcard :

I like Augustus's position here (it was strong in the real AHs and only borders one unfriendly face), and he seems likely to be one of the top two.

The second is much more difficult to guess. Obviously one of the four warmongers, but whom? Boudy and Augustus both being so successful seems unlikely. Kublai's position was too beset by the barbs in the real AHs. Could it be Napoleon, then? Snowballing from his corner position? It seems as likely as any option.

Napoleon and Augustus for top two, then. Order is a crapshoot since they were virtually identical, so I ordered them based on which I thought made more sense to reach which playoff map.

It seems likely that the other three warmongers occupy the other three spots with double digit kill totals. Fairly similar performances except that one was able to win twice. It's a tossup, but Boudy does have that appealing triple gold start. I'll guess that she occassionally murdered Augustus and snowballed from there. Of the other two, Alex is more central and so probably survived less than Kublai.

The other four spots are fairly similar except that one survived and killed a lot more. I'm guessing Roosevelt for that one, his position is fairly sheltered and he might have knocked off Liz sometimes. Pacal for #5, surviving sometimes but struggling to pull ahead in this scenario and often fodder for the warmongers (Napoleon probably had to kill him a bunch to finish so well if that is him). That leaves Liz and Asoka for the last two spots, in bad positions but each able to win once. (Certainly more likely than one of them amassing a dozen kills.)

So my final ordering:
Augustus Caesar
Napoleon
Boudica
Roosevelt
Pacal II
Elizabeth
Asoka
Alexander
Kublai Khan

Spoiler Playoff 1 :

Between the kill count and Huayna's presence in the very strong Ramesses spot, it's not hard to guess that the low peaceweights came out on top here. Very similar statlines for all three with one just winning a bit more. Huayna is the obvious pick there; the big surprise is that he wasn't more successful!

The other two are a true coinflip. I will guess Qin moved on since he was in position to be more likely to nab the extra kill. That of course puts Hannibal in third.

Who else managed a pair of wins, then? My knee-jerk reaction is Hatty since she's the best one at actually winning. But she's sandwiched in with the low peaceweights. Instead I think Isabella is the most likely candidate; a good religious alliance could lead her to a couple of unlikely victories and that spot was pretty good in the real AHs as well.

Churchill's position is just as bad as it was in the real game (worse, really), but he's at least more likely to survive/kill than Hatty.

So my final ordering:
Huayna Capac
Qin Shi Huang
Hannibal
Isabella
Churchill
Hatshepsut

Spoiler Playoff 2 :

We have Napoleon in the Tokugawa position, and that means Darius is alone and super doomed. One down.

Louis's position is even better than in the real game since Darius now represents a chance for easy gains. So I think it's clear that he wins again.

Who wins if Louis doesn't? Probably De Gaulle now that his prickly northern neighbor has been replaced with a tasty snack.

Cyrus is both a better leader IMO and has a better position than Sulei/Napoleon, so he's the other one who managed to scrape out a win. Of the other two, I put Napoleon in fourth because he's more likely to be in enough dogpiles to get the higher kill tally.

So my final ordering:
Louis XIV
De Gaulle
Cyrus
Napoleon
Suleiman
Darius I

Spoiler Playoff 3 :

In this setup, Augustus in the center is a marked man. Last place for him.

Justinian's position is a bit tricky, but this is Justin we're talking about. I think he can still come out on top and 20 kills is a result I'd expect from him more than Willem.

Willem's position is still good, but more risky with Cathy/Gilgamesh as neighbors than it was with Gandhi/Qin. He still gets a good number of wins and makes the big game, which is what really matters.

Our other sometime winner with a good number of kills... hm. Gilgamesh's position was pretty bad in the AHs, but that was partially because it was Gandhi and everybody hated him. Gilgamesh with a dogpile target next to him is probably more viable. We'll go with that.

Cathy has a more dangerous central position but is more likely to actually win than a Shaka who has Willem on the other side of the map.

So my final ordering:
Justinian I
Willem van Oranje
Gilgamesh
Catherine
Shaka
Augustus Caesar

Spoiler Championship :

Oh look, Huayna made the championship again! No need to overthink this one.

...or is there? Creative was found to be extremely strong on this map. First place didn't get so many kills and only survived a single game that he didn't win. That sounds more like the relative peaceweight outlier Willem to me. Willem for champion!

Of course, Huayna gets the next spot.

I think Justinian for fourth, actually. I wouldn't attribute him the sole win... but I would the highest kill count and good survival rate. Who gets four wins, then? Louis seems most likely due to Creative.

That leaves De Lol and Qin in the last two spots. We will guess Qin for #5 since De Lol is probably too busy getting dogpiled because nobody else has a 0 peaceweight.

So my final ordering:
Willem van Oranje
Huayna Capac
Louis XIV
Justinian I
Qin Shi Huang
De Gaulle

 

[Thrasybulos]

I'm leaving tomorrow for a 3-day week-end, I'll see wether I can post the results before that.
If not, it'll have to wait until Sunday evening.

 

[Thrasybulos]

Eauxps and pen-dragon correctly identified that HC for once wasn't the winner (good job!), but unfortunately failed to get the actual winner (wasn't hard, was it... he was the actual season winner! ).

@a pen-dragon got Willem, HC, Justinian, De Gaulle: 4 pts.
@Keler and @Eauxps I. Fourgott got everyone ( ): 6 pts.

 

[Thrasybulos]

Next up: Season 1.

I have published my results for the Opening Round here.

For the final rounds, we get the following game composition:

Spoiler Wildcard Map :

Spoiler Playoff 1 Map :

This is very close to the actual live game composition... except the live game had a dead man walking right in the middle of the map, which is not the case here and should change the game dynamics by quite a bit.

Spoiler Playoff 2 Map :

Spoiler Playoff 3 Map :

Note: Brennus is not in the expected spot because Sullla had misplaced Zara who should have had the last position but was given position number 3. I have restored the "correct" placements.

Spoiler Championship Map :

The game results were:

So... who made it to the Championship game? And who was the Champion?

 

[Eauxps I. Fourgott]

When are you posting the full results for these? Going to make me spoil some details early...

 

[Thrasybulos]

In a coupla days.
Game compositions are different, and Keler's already posted his results about map balance. I think we're out of spoiler territory, now.

 

[Keler]

Yes, that was almost unbelievable (they were exactly tied until game 18!), which unfortunately here makes it a pure lucky guess.
I use wins > survivals > kills as a tie-breaker for the same scores, but I never imagined I could have two top leaders exactly tied after 20 games!
If that had happened, I don't know how I would have settled it: random draw? Play a 21st game and use that result to break the tie? Use the live game result as the tie-breaker?

I say play a 21st game if that ever happens. That would be too much of a coincidence

Okay. Season 1 it is. I hope Season 8 comes after this

Wildcard:
Someone is very dominant with 13 victories! I wouldn't expect that. That 15 survivol zero win number 5 must be Gilgamesh. Washington is dead last. Charlemagne or Ragnar does worse? no idea. But all that matters is guessing the top 2 right.
1-Peter, 13 wins??? seriously
2-Napoleon, my final answer, because spoils of America.
3 and 4 Alex, Mao or something vice versa, maybe one of them is second. They are all so close.

Playoff 1:
Ok Justinian has a corner alright. Creativewarmongers are not really good allies to him. And rest of the map sucks... soooo
1-Justinian
2-Catherine
3-Kublai Khan.
I assume Huayna won a game, Hannibal too, I am not guessing which one is 4th or 5th, and that leaves Sury with no victory?

Playoff 2:
So I should place Napoleon here. Augustus looks so bad.
1-Mansa Musa
2-Pericles, because Mansa needs one ally in the final to win a game.
3-Cyrus

Playoff 3:
Elizabeth rip. Others are pretty tough to predict.
1-Peter, I have no idea actually.
2-Brennus
3-Shaka
4-Qin
5-Saladin
6-Elizabeth

Championship:
1-Justinian
2-Catherine
3-Pericles
4-Peter
5-Brennus
6-Mansa Musa

 

[a pen-dragon]

Spoiler Wildcard :

Gilga - Peter - Alex - Ragnar - Nappy - Charly - Mao - Washington

IMO the best two positions are the ones of Alex and Peter. While Perter does have the econ prowess to do something with it Alex will probably squander it by attacking someone before grabbing his very contested (due to the central start) backlines. Gilga also has lots of land, but a big part of it is tundra, making his early landgrab going southwards very important. Then he does have the capacity to gobble up washington and win from there.

Btw, Washington and Charly are the only high-PW on this map. This is very relevant for Washington who will face Ragnar, Gilga and Napoleon, condemning him to a very poor game. His start is OK-ish but his capital has lots of forrests and the surroundings have lots of jungle. He is a very natural pick for last place. Charly will fare better, due to being in a corner and Mao being his only neighbour. Still winning a game will be close to impossible to him, but he could kill Mao sometimes. He is amongst the last three.

I do not think that Ragnar will fare well. I think he got the poorest start on this map with comparatively little land and lots of jungle. Snowballing after conquering Washington is possible. For Nappy the situation is similar, although generally better. His problem is the dry land he starts in with low econ potential. This will make it very hard to keep up in tech. Mao is in a worse position due to relatively poor land and facing Charly, who is a tougher target. I think Mao will not be doing well either, and due to missing a good snowball target I think is the last of the bottom-three.

So I have five contenders for winning games. Gilga and Peter are the most likely to do so. Alex would have to attack another low-PW but when has that ever stopped him? His land is that good that he will win a few games. That leaves Ragnar or Nappy. I think that of these two Nappy is way more likely to end up nwith the record of the fifth, due to not winning. Ragnar thus probably is fourth.

On top I think Gilga is best. I will give the second place to Peter due to more wins and less kills.

Spoiler Playoff 1 :

Justinian - Cathy - HC - Sury - Kublai - Hannibal

Most of the starting positions on this map are decent, but only one stands out for being better, namely the one that Kublai gets. It has great land, rivers, and gold. HC and Cathy have positions that also fulfill the first two conditions, but will have to work for early happiness. Justinian just has a little worse land than Kublai, but is in a corner. Then there is Hannibal who sits in the plains and Sury, who probably gets the least land. Long term it is Cathy who has the best position due to having more backlines.

This looks like a map of warmongers with substantial econ competence. Facing this situation I do not think that HC will do too well, so at best he will get third. Cathy and Justinian will outperform him. I think that Sury looks likely to survive frequently without achieving much, so I will stick him to fourth. Due to his weak central position I think that Hannibal is last.

Due to IMHO being a better AI and the slightly better land, Justinian gets first, Cathy second. Having only seven kills for three wins is too little for Kublai, so HC will get third. (Had the third had more kills I would happily have placed HC fifth on this map.)

Spoiler Playoff 2 :

Cyrus - Peter - Mansa - Boudica - Augustus - Pericles

I usually start looking at the map, but here the third is obviously Mansa. I think that only Hatty and Gandhi could contest such a record.

Now on to the map! AC is in a bad position, a desert to one side, Cyrus to another. I think his only real option is wiping Cyrus. The same Cyrus that probably has the best position on the map. Admittedly there is no early happiness, but he has wine, calendar resources and is charismatic. That will get him along fine. Furthermore the only leader with a credible claim to his south is Boudica in a position that is worse in evry aspect, except not bordering Rome, with a weak econ leader. And then there are Pericles and Peter, with mediocre starts.

Looking at the records, the winning non-Mansa leaders all have 10+ kills, so probably are not Pericles. The fifth does not look like Pericles due to too many kills, so he is probably last.

Cyrus and Augustus will fight in most games, and whoever wins has a very good shot to win. Pericles probably does way better than Augustus, due to the better position, I put him first. Still, Preatorians remain a threat, but the first has 85% survival, so Augustus probably got unlucky, with only three possible full conquests (+maybe a few partial ones). Also once Cyrus is out Augie will fight Boudica and Peter, paveing the road for Mansa to do Mansa stuff. Augie goes fifth.

Peter goes third due to being better than Boudica, and also not having Cyrus as only neighbour in most games.

Spoiler Playoff 3 :

Gilga - Saladin - Brennus - Shaka - Elizabeth - Qin

Soooo, this is my first time seeing a riverside oasis, was this edited? With Gilga coming from the Wildcard game, this is a map with some serious warmongers, and Saladin acting as Elizabeth's shield. Elizabeth has poor land to top it off, so the only reason she is that I do not think she is likely to get any kills. Even one may be a stretch. Also, Qin has a poor position, due to being in a corner, and bordering desert. I think he is last.

Gilga takes the top position due to being a very good leader in this setup and having a great start. Saladin somehow manages second, because he still has very good land and is a decent AI. Also because the second has the lowest survival of the top-four. Brennus does better than Shaka due to better land.

Spoiler Championship :

HC is not in the Championship? Surely he did not win it then? Even the Inca are not that broken.

Saladin is the odd one out with a PW of 4. This map also has significantly different positions. Mostly due to rivers. Cyrus will start in the deramland for anyone cottaging. Gilga and Saladin have decent positions, too and Justinian and Peter are far away from any significant rivers. Cathy has a small one.

I will not really go into details of the map dynamcis, because those leaders arre quite similar in PW, and a lot will depend on how they roll. What stands out is the last two surviving much less. I think that Peter and Cathy will struggle to keep up with the probably fast tech-pace.

In the front, Cyruis first, due to rivers, then Gilga, Saladin Justinian:

Cyrus - Gilga - Saladin - Justinian - Cathy - Peter

 

[Thrasybulos]

Soooo, this is my first time seeing a riverside oasis, was this edited?

Sullla tended to edit/add rivers in the first seasons but didn't know Oasis shouldn't be riverside tiles (he was surprised and doubtful when it was mentionned on other occasions to him in the livestream).
I did fix it in the map I played (moved the river one tile away from the oasis iirc), but that shouldn't matter.

HC is not in the Championship? Surely he did not win it then? Even the Inca are not that broken.

 

[Eauxps I. Fourgott]

All right, now that I've posted what I found for these games, it's time for me to make my own guesses:

Spoiler Wildcard :

I found that the Zara position was overpowered on this map, and Peter has a similarly favorable diplo situation. I think he has to have the 65% winrate.

After that it's largely a crapshoot, but I can make some guesses. Unlike in the real version, there are two clear peaceweight outcasts, so they most likely are two of the worst performances. The exposed Washington in particular seems quite doomed and I put him for last.

Burger King I bump up to sixth, though. The out-of-the-way corner and his not-too-high peaceweight let him do OK on occassion.

Taking his place in seventh is Ragnar. He'll never sit still and has a crappy starting position, which equals a very poor track record.

Who's the leader who survived a lot but never won? Probably Gilgamesh. His position is extremely sheltered but not that strong.

That leaves Napoleon, Alex, and Mao to split the last three positions. One survives a lot less than the others and the central, won't-sit-still Alex seems like the best bet. The last two are basically interchangeable and it's anybody's guess who finishes in which spot. I'll guess Nappy does slightly better than Mao, though.

So my final answer is Peter-Napoleon-Mao-Alex-Gilgamesh-Charlemagne-Ragnar-Washington.

Spoiler Playoff One :

Despite Thrasy's assertions, I think the dynamics here are pretty much the same as in my replays. That makes this an easy one to guess.

Justin and Cathy first and second. Could conceivably be swapped as well but on principle I always put Justin first.

Huayna is definitely #4 with decent survival rate but only one unlikely win, and Sury is just as dead here as he was with Cyrus as a neighbor.

The only somewhat tough one is which of Kublai or Hannibal does better, since neither is a marked man. Ultimately though their statlines are nearly identical, just with one better at winning instead of just surviving. That screams Financial Hannibal to me.

So my final answer is Justinian-Catherine-Hannibal-Huayna-Kublai-Suryavarman.

Spoiler Playoff Two :

While there are a lot of different faces here, the overall map dynamics are the same in terms of peaceweight and mostly in terms of personality types, so I expect similar outcomes.

Let's get the obvious out of the way: nobody except Mansa could possibly have won four games with zero kills. Especially since he only survived a single other game. That puts him as #3 and indicates that in this set, the high peaceweights were far less successful and it was almost exclusively low peaceweight romp results. This is part of why I guessed Napoleon instead of Mao as #2 from the Wildcard: a more proactive leader in the center matches up well with the low peacweights knocking the peaceniks out more often.

Cyrus's position was the clear strongest in my replays, so I think he wins more. While Alex did better than Qin in my set, I think in this case Napoleon having better access to the high peaceweight punching bags will make him a more viable choice. Sorry Boudy.

That leaves Augustus and Pericles equally screwed. While normally I'd expect Augustus to be the more kill-y of the two, given their respective positions I think Perry has the better odds to pull it off here.

So my final answer is Cyrus-Napoleon-Mansa-Boudica-Pericles-Augustus.

Spoiler Playoff Three :

I haven't finished this map yet, but my results so far suggest that it's largely a crapshoot.

However, this is the one case where we have a distinctly different field. Liz is now a peaceweight outcast, so she's probably pretty screwed. Last place.

Who survives a ton but almost never scores any kills? Probably the not-so-militaristic Qin in his out-of-the-way corner.

Saladin borders the map's resident punching bag which gives him a soft target, as well as naturally one of the best positions to expand well into. I think there is a very good chance that this translates into his being the #1 leader.

What about #2? I think the strongest overall position on this map is Brennus's. He's not a great leader but this is a pretty mediocre field in general. I think he can manage it.

That leaves Peter and Shaka for teh two middle spots, and I have more faith in Peter to pull off a quartet of wins.

So my final answer is Saladin-Brennus-Peter-Shaka-Qin-Elizabeth.

Spoiler Championship :

Field: Justinian, Catherine, Cyrus, Napoleon, Saladin, Brennus. All similar in peaceweight so no outcasts there. Matches up with everybody getting at least one win.

Maybe not so much with the two very low survival rates. But I can't envision any high PWs finishing top two on any of those playoff maps!

#1... let's be boring and say Justinian.

Who's the worst leaders from this field? They're probably most likely to be the two duds. I'm saying Brennus and Napoleon to that one.

Sal feels right for the very high survival rate of #3, and Cathy for the boom or bust of #2 although I'm somewhat skeptical about her doing that well. That leaves Cyrus for the last spot.

So my final answer is Justinian-Catherine-Saladin-Cyrus-Napoleon-Brennus.

 

[Thrasybulos]

So, none of you got the Champion.
I had dropped a subtle (?) hint by providing the Championship map for the first time (neighbours...), but of course it required spotting Pericles making it to the Championship game, which was a tough order in itself. Keler had it... but he missed Saladin being there.

@Keler got Justinian, Cathy, Pericles, Brennus: 4 pts.
@a pen-dragon got Justinian, Cathy, Saladin, Cyrus: 4 pts.
@Eauxps I. Fourgott got Justinian, Cathy, Saladin, Cyrus, Brennus: 5 pts.