ALC Game #9: Incas/Huayna Capac

Round 11: to 1880 AD

I can always tell when an ALC game is in the bag, because the posts inevitably stray off-topic.

I started the round by making my promised civics change:



Again, my thinking here was: State Property for more food from some of my production tiles, foreign trade routes now that the AIs were switching from mercantilism, and, of course, reduced maintenance costs so I could build fewer courthouses. Note to self: if you're about to switch to SP, you can STOP building courthouses and the Forbidden Palace. Thanks to a moment my inattention, I needlessly built the former in Thebes and the latter in Heliopolis. Sheesh.

Besides SP, I adopted Emancipation to speed the growth of some of my cottages, and to punish the AI civs a little. It turns out that may have been very effective, as we'll see later. I kept Representation for the research bonus from the specialists, and to keep Cyrus happy. Universal Suffrage is Freddy's favourite civic, but he was already Friendly; it's Washington's fave as well, but Cyrus has a much bigger population and therefore more votes.

I also changed research by starting my bee-line to Mass Media for the UN. My Great Engineer left Golden Horse and boarded the next galleon bound for the northern continent and Athens.

The civics changed proved very worthwhile, as I was able to raise the research slider from 50% to 70% at a slight deficit, which Wall Street and a few more banks quickly erased. A few turns later, I had my first of the three remaining technologies:



Shortly after this, the AI leaders started coming around proposing all sorts of deals. First up was Frederick:



I thought it over carefully, but turned him down. He's already friendly, and I wanted to keep Washington and Cyrus happy with me. If I'd wanted the peace of mind to pursue a space race win, I would have agreed. I also didn't trade for that oil, since I didn't need it, and I'm already trading a lot of helpful resources to Germany. Freddy probably would have wanted at least two resources for it, minimum.

Cyrus also came by offering me railroad for Electricity and a whole whack of gold, but I also turned him down. The last thing I wanted to do now, when I was so close to winning, was to help the AI civs in any way.

Of course, there's a price to pay for that:



Oh well, I'm now focused on the techs I need, not snapping up every advance in sight.

Speaking of which, in 1862 I got #2 of 3, thanks to a little more deficit spending:



One more tech to go! As you can imagine, I kept checking the victory condition screen to make sure that the much-despised Corsican was still 2nd in population.



He nudged down from 20% to 19%, but I reasoned that that was because I was shooting up to 45% pretty quickly thanks to biology, and because I was having most of my citizens assigned to food-rich tiles.

I then completed my next wonder:



That provided a very nice boost to research, income, production... you name it. It was nice to get back the free specialists I'd lost by abandoning mercantilism.

And in 1868 I got the last, crucial piece of the puzzle:



I immediately swooped in on Athens, my ironworks city and production powerhouse, to see how long it would take to build the UN:



Only 9 turns, thanks to 193 hammers per turn! Not bad--behold the power of the riverside ironworks!

Of course, I remembered that I had a great engineer.



The math was a no-brainer. With 840 hammers from Benny, the UN would be completed on the next turn. As, indeed, it was:



So now the voting started. The first task was to get elected to the Secretary-Generalship of the UN. This was an important vote because it would give me a pretty good idea of how the AI would vote on the diplomatic victory resolution.



So I had enough votes just on my own to win this election. On top of that, everyone voted for me except Napoleon! Sweet. I now knew that victory was at hand; I just needed the turns to go by so I could propose the necessary resolution.

In 1878, the opportunity arose:



426 votes needed, and I had 319. Based on the previous numbers, I needed Cyrus to vote for me, or if he didn't (highly unlikely), I needed Washington and Frederick's votes.

I needn't have worried:



YIPPEE!!! :D

Now, on to the post-mortem!
 
nice win..again. ;) once you decided to go diplomatic it seemed to fly by (granted you were pretty close..)

i would be interested to see you take the last save and go for a domination. it would be a great learning tool for strategies: a second large scale invasion against semi-worthy opponents, seeing how you decide to work the diplomacy, and of course if taking out Nappy and George wasn't enough, who would you attack next. :D
 
Post-Mortem

Remember how I thought that Emancipation helped with this victory? Here's why I think that:



Yes, I had managed to build Scotland Yard (in Athens) and my first few spies. On the turn before victory, my first Spy arrived in Persia and revealed that several of Cyrus' cities were in this condition of stagnation--thanks largely to all the people made unhappy because of their desire for Emancipation. Cyrus and Frederick both had Biology, which Napoleon still lacked even in 1880, but they apparently had trouble growing their populations, partly because of my civics change. Of course, based on the votes, they had a long way to go to surpass France. Apparently Napoleon's invasion of America, as well has his capture of one or two German cities, made all the difference.

Now if this had been Warlords, Washington would undoubtedly have become someone's vassal. I'm not sure how that would have changed things--any ideas?

Here are the end-game graphs. First off, score for the whole game:



GNP (Gold):



Heh. Lots of ups and downs as I obtained a profit and then went into deficit spending to support my research.

Production:



More of a slow, steady climb. You can see a jump when I got Biology and was able to work more hammer-heavy tiles, and a sudden drop in the late game when I changed civics from Mercantilism to State Property and lost a lot of free engineer specialists.

And food:



Interesting. The AI doesn't seem to jump up as much from Biology, I suspect because it tends to run a specialist economy--therefore it pulls more citizens off the land rather than growing its cities.

And Power, first off for the whole game:



And the last 50 turns:



Remember how I avoided researching and delayed trading for Rifling? I think that accounts for why Cyrus and Napoleon surpassed me and Frederick was catching up on me. But with my positive diplomatic relations, Napoleon's lack of Astronomy even at the end of the game, and the AI's known ineptitude at inter-continental invasions, I didn't really need to be tops in power.

The demographics:



First in everything except soldiers. Very "civilized", I think, if you'll excuse the pun.

The top 5 cities:



Hey, 2 outta 5 ain't bad.

And the statistics:



And finally, my score:



Hey, my 2nd highest ALC score ever, after the Hatshepsut domination game! I probably could have had an even higher score if, as some of you pointed out, I'd focused on the UN rather than going after Hatty. But hey, I had fun.

Nevertheless, that's a valid point. I've been guilty of not focusing on the victory condition early enough in the past, and here I did it again. As I said, I like to have my fun, but one day it's bound to turn around and bite me. I think we'll make that a goal of upcoming ALC games: once the best victory condition is clarified and selected, focus on it. Like a frickin' laser beam.

I'm nonetheless very proud of this win and thankful to all of you who helped. I usually play fractal maps in my off-line games, so I end up on a continent by myself more often. This was my first Monarch level win under those conditions, so it's good to see that it can be done. I tend to expand a little too slowly in my off-line games--I stick to the 60% rule a little too literally; in this game, some rapid expansion, and acceptance of a lowered science slider, ensured that I had an entire continent as a solid base. I have to remember that the 60% rule is NOT a rule, but a guideline, and one that's better for beginners and the lower levels anyway.

At any rate, I look forward to everyone else's thoughts on this, the first ALC on Monarch and the last on vanilla Civ IV.

The next ALC game will be played on Warlords, Monarch level. Remember we're going in alphabetical order through the civs, playing as the less popular leaders when offered a choice, so India is next and the leader will be Asoka. This game will not start for several days, however, since I need to purchase Warlords, apply the patch when it's released, and play at least a couple of games off-line to get used to all the changes. In the meantime, I'll be updating the epic saga of the Roman Empire that I've begun in Stories and Tales... please check it out and let me know what you think.

Oh, darn... I forgot to save the game after the win. The best I have is an auto-save two turns back:
 
LosBlack said:
nice win..again. ;) once you decided to go diplomatic it seemed to fly by (granted you were pretty close..)

i would be interested to see you take the last save and go for a domination. it would be a great learning tool for strategies: a second large scale invasion against semi-worthy opponents, seeing how you decide to work the diplomacy, and of course if taking out Nappy and George wasn't enough, who would you attack next. :D
Interesting... I was also thinking of going back and playing through to an alternate ending. Except I was thinking of re-loading the save before I went after Hatty, leaving her alone, and bee-lining to the UN! :lol:

For a domination win, I would have invaded Napoleon, going after his lone coastal city on his west coast. I also would have parked several Frigates outside his eastern coastal city, to catch and sink any counter-invasion force he may have tried to launch. I would have tried to keep the AIs out of it, since I would have wanted and needed to grab as much land myself for the win.

Since Washington and would likely have kept a defensive pact with Cyrus, if Napoleon's lands had not been enough, my buddy Frederick would have been my next victim--especially since Cyrus was only pleased with Frederick and Washington cautious. I suspect, since Cyrus and Frederick are Creative, that I would indeed have needed to attack one of them for the win--their cultural borders probably would have been pressuring my new French acquisitions. This scenario is a big reason why diplomatic was a much more attractive win to pursue--it was easier and faster by far.
 
Sisiutil said:
Remember how I thought that Emancipation helped with this victory? Here's why I think that:

Emancipation certainly helped keep Napoleon in front, which made things easier, but I'm still convinced that you would have won regardless. Washington's votes were in the bag either way. You might have lost either Frederick or Cyrus if they outpaced Napoleon, but the other would still have been on your side. That would have made for a very close vote, but you only needed 83 votes after yours and Washington's, so you would have made it.

Now if this had been Warlords, Washington would undoubtedly have become someone's vassal. I'm not sure how that would have changed things--any ideas?

Interesting question. The master gets half the votes, and the vassal gets the other half. If the master is a candidate, the vassal must vote for the master, but I think they can theoretically vote differently if the master isn't in the race. Assuming identical populations on the final turn (which is probably unrealistic, but it's the best we've got) ...

If Washington was Napoleon's vassal you would still have won. It would probably have been more critical to keep Napoleon at #2 (I think you would need both Frederick and Cyrus on your side), but with the added population from America, that would have been less of a risk.

If Washington was your vassal, it wouldn't have made any difference.

If Washington was Frederick or Cyrus' vassal, you might have lost. That might have pushed Frederick ahead of Napoleon, and it would almost certainly have pushed Cyrus ahead. I don't think you would have the votes.

This neglects a lot of tricky issues like improved growth from additional resources extorted from the vassal, gifting cities to change the population rankings, etc. But it's probably a good approximation.

I'm surprised to see that Cyrus was #3 in population. I had always assumed it was Frederick, since he was #2 in land mass.
 
Sisiutil said:
This scenario is a big reason why diplomatic was a much more attractive win to pursue--it was easier and faster by far.

I also find them more interesting and challenging at this point. This is a game where if you had decided to go for domination or space race, there's really no question at all that you can do it. With more than double the land mass and population of any of your competitors, it's just a matter of going through the motions. With diplomatic, on the other hand, things were a little bit tense. We all thought you had it sewn up, but you still needed to pay attention to make it work.

I find that a "proper" diplomatic win that is based on diplomacy rather than just having the population is a win that requires a really complete game where you pay attention to every decision from start to finish. You can't go all out technology, military, culture, religion, etc. You need to balance everything and make sure that you consider the diplomatic impact of each decision.
 


It looks to me as though your play is a little bit loose here. Obviously sufficient for the win, but just to point out a few things...

Big problem: you are four sizes too small. With Police State coming, you know that you are going to be able to carry the larger production, but you need to get there. Nice upside: farms, watermills, and mines don't need to mature, so you can rip them down as need be. You definitely needed to kick the city into maximum growth, then flop it over to maximum hammers, with the appropriate retooling of improvements.

Minor issues: I'm shaking my head at working the winery 2/5/1 tile instead of the 3/4/2 watermill. I'm skeptical of the presence of the winery at all, of course - I'd expect to see a 2/2/3 workshop on that tile.

Amusingly enough, the windmill on the upper right corner, though eccentric, isn't particularly wrong. Lacking railroads, Mines and Windmills have the same production yield, but the latter is generating more commerce. So you'd like to have windmills on the 5 bare hills. The problem of course is that once you get up to size you have little use for the extra food; windmill to mine trades 1F+3C for 1H, just as watermill to workshop does. Tomato tomahto.
 
I guess you are right, VoU, about the tile management, although that is also my weakest point later in the game. However, I don't think it matters much considering his victory type and the GE waiting to rush the UN.

OK, your focus could have been better, but I think this round was pretty good! Going straight for the win, no delays, excellent.

Warlords will be great. You prob. have seen many of it's features, but with the new patch it will be far more difficult. Monarch will be like playing Emperor with Blake's Mod. I am forgetting about playing Immortal anymore and falling back to Emperor. Stalin is great on Warlords btw.
 
Congratulations on the win. Getting a clean sweep of the AIs is always satisfying :goodjob:
 
Great win again. Just be sure your frickin' laser is mounted on the head of sharks. That'll show 'em.
 
Congratulations. Nice victory! Learned a lot about the diplomatic victory from your game. Only tried it once myself, and it backfired pretty bad. Cyrus won instead :hammer2:

And thanks for making these games. They're fun and educational. Keep up the good work :goodjob:
 
Great win! Oh, and it feels like deja-vu all over again. (and I think I posted this before...) My latest game also finished with a beeline to the UN. The funny thing is, the first time around I was one vote short! Second time I got exactly the needed number of votes. :D Gifting Biology to allies isn't as helpful as I thought it would be.
 
Dr Elmer Jiggle said:
I find that a "proper" diplomatic win that is based on diplomacy rather than just having the population is a win that requires a really complete game where you pay attention to every decision from start to finish. You can't go all out technology, military, culture, religion, etc. You need to balance everything and make sure that you consider the diplomatic impact of each decision.

Well, actually I would say there is a cut off point after which many decisions you make are actually important for a diplomatic win. If you're playing continents, this is usually at the time when you meet people from the other continent. On pangea or something, it could be the point when a faction becomes clearly dominant (assuming that you, as the human, is a relative outsider). Decisions made before that point are usually (and thankfully) risk-free.

Sometimes, the diplomatic situation in the world is just too screwed up for diplomacy to be a viable path to victory. In that case, however carefully you make your decisions, before the cut off point or after it, you still can't win without conquering your way to a 'backdoor' election win. In my own games, this is usually why I would aim for a space win.
 
Well done Sisiutil. Congratulations on a fine win and another interesting game. :beer:


VoiceOfUnreason said:
Amusingly enough, the windmill on the upper right corner, though eccentric, isn't particularly wrong. Lacking railroads, Mines and Windmills have the same production yield, but the latter is generating more commerce. So you'd like to have windmills on the 5 bare hills. The problem of course is that once you get up to size you have little use for the extra food; windmill to mine trades 1F+3C for 1H, just as watermill to workshop does. Tomato tomahto.

Extra food can be easily used to support engineers for even more hammers. The Ironworks city in Athens is only half developed and needs to grow larger and build a factory to make the most of this good site. The game has ended too soon for it to shine. Poor health there is an issue that can be solved by researching Medicine and Refrigeration.
 
aelf said:
Well, actually I would say there is a cut off point after which many decisions you make are actually important for a diplomatic win.

I think I know what you mean, and I mostly agree, though I would argue it's that before the imaginary cutoff you can manage the risk and recover from the problems more than that they're risk free. I think one of your first Emperor Masters' challenges provides a good demonstration of what I mean. I'm talking about the first one you won by diplomacy where you gifted a holy city to someone in exchange for peace. That wasn't a case where that early war didn't matter in terms of the diplomatic win. You just had more time and more options for recovering. The only reason you were able to bring that guy (Mehmed?) back into the fold as an ally is because you thought about it from the beginning and made sure you didn't damage relations to a point where things couldn't be undone.

Sometimes, the diplomatic situation in the world is just too screwed up for diplomacy to be a viable path to victory.

That's definitely true, though it happens far less often than I used to think. I think you'll agree that the more experienced you become with diplomacy and the diplomatic victory, the more you realize that what you thought was a completely screwed up situation really isn't. The completely screwed up situation does occur, but there are often ways to recover if you make sure you look at all the angles.
 
Yes, VoU, I had a mental note on the cork board in the back of my mind to eventually do something with that winery around Athens, and with the windmill once I had railroads. Once I got railroads, though (the next tech after Mass Media), my workers were running about laying down track.

Because I did not get a chance to pursue my usual early wars, and because of the separate continents, I felt like I never had enough workers in this game. I probably should have built more of them, but I'm so used to capturing more than enough of the little buggers that it kept slipping my mind.
 
Dr Elmer Jiggle said:
I think I know what you mean, and I mostly agree, though I would argue it's that before the imaginary cutoff you can manage the risk and recover from the problems more than that they're risk free.

You could certainly say that. However, in the case of a continents map, what you do on your continent before you meet the AIs from the other continent would not matter to them. The only way you can be affected is if another civ on your continent met people from the other continent first, in which case how you deal with that civ before you meet the overseas folks yourself might affect how they see you. Ultimately, I think a diplomatic victory depends on the diplomatic modifiers and population. At least on a continents map, only the population part can be planned for since early in the game, and the strategies adopted for that purpose are pretty generic and not specific to a diplomatic win.

Of course, this is all assuming that you're not aiming for a peaceful diplomatic victory from the start.

Dr Elmer Jiggle said:
I think you'll agree that the more experienced you become with diplomacy and the diplomatic victory, the more you realize that what you thought was a completely screwed up situation really isn't. The completely screwed up situation does occur, but there are often ways to recover if you make sure you look at all the angles.

I agree with this. For example, if it had turned out that Cyrus did surpass Napoleon in population in this game, Sisiutil could still win by ensuring that Freddy and Washington were friendlier to him than to Cyrus. This might not be a good example of a screwed up situation, but at least it's one where plans might have to be readjusted.
 
I'm looking forward to the next ALC, especially with the new patch which includes much of Blake's improved AI work.

The mod definitely improves the AI play and should make the Monarch level game very interesting, although our fearless leader is getting so good at this game that he may have to bump it a level. :)

Keep up the good work. :goodjob:
 
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