Blackbetsy HOF Attempts

[BlackBetsy]

One mental note that I have taken from my current game is that the Americans and English - both relatively large and modern civs - were wiped out VERY quickly when I brought the Russians (large and tech parity with me) and Germans (smaller and just behind on tech with me) into the war via military alliance. The Russian Cossacks absolute creamed the British, who mostly had Riflemen, through sheer numbers and firepower (Cossacks have 3X attacks, of course). The British started the war when they razed a newly founded, undefended town on an island off the Pangaea that had the world's only spice supplies. Maybe 7 turns later, they were reduced to a one city civ on that same island and a turn later they were gone. The Americans were dead in 12 turns, I think, and I grabbed their one lux (3 gems) before the Russians could roll through.

I've wondered how I could use other AI to wipe out other civs to speed conquest games and am thinking about the right conditions here. They don't wipe each other out in early games very often, but when its Cavalry vs. Riflemen, the speed of conquest and sheer numbers that are in play make it more likely. I'll see if I can use that in future conquest games.

 

[BlackBetsy]

This is my highest beaker per turn ever....624 Beakers per turn with SETI built

Edit - eventually peaked out at 657.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Considering my next challenge. I'm tempted to go Huge Emperor for 20k, and to keep my 20k momentum going, but I think Bartleby is going to make it tough to get anything but 4th, which is what I just got on Large. I don't see any other 3rd places that are tempting out there. 3rd place Tiny Deity is 1545! 3rd place Standard Deity is 1670, and I have no idea if I can win a Deity 20k game. MAYBE Byzantines on an archipelago with 2d city? I'd set my 1st city up for the plunder trade and hope I'd get 2 or 3 luxes on my island.

Otherwise, @Spoonwood made a good argument for doing a Histographic victory @ Demigod or higher level for a score. My conquest game had a really high Firaxis score and I could have just sat at the Dom limit and milked the final 100+ turns. I am not entirely sure I'm excited about spending a month or more doing a Histographic Huge game....

The other area where I'd like to improve is my 5th place Domination score. Back in 2005, I was doing a LOT of dominations, and racked up a bunch of #1s (including, of course, on empty tables). Of the 24 games I submitted, 16 of them were dominations. Of those 16, only 5 remain on the tables, with the 540 AD Huge Monarch Domination being the best one. That one is #5 by a bunch, with the top score being 370 BC (I don't understand that, must be the smallest most compact Pang ever). You really need to have MapFinder to play for fast dominations, as a bad/big map can really set you back. I am really thinking about doing something silly like running a Windows XP box remotely with C3C and MapFinder installed and just spitting out maps all day!

 

[BlackBetsy]

Just started/abandoned a game at Huge Demigod for 20k. Still with Babylon going for Mysticism SGL. Took me 31 turns to get Mysticism with a river/cow start, which is sub optimal but I still should be beating the AI to it since they need to do CB AND Mysticism. No luck on first start, although my 20k/second city on the coast was very shield rich but food poor.

Update: It's really hard to find a second city location on the sea with good shields per turn in addition to a starting river cow. Lots of starts that were abandoned when I wasn't even near the sea.

 

[BlackBetsy]

I am consistently hitting Mysticism first, I believe, but still haven't gotten an SGL yet in about 8 chances. I have to do way more iterations on this run - Huge Demigod - on the theory that I do a second city on the coast should be my 20k city and maybe 1/3 of starting locations have good coastal 2nd city with decent shield potential on fresh water.

One thing I am running in to is that Mysticism *isn't even worth Masonry* to the AI. And it wasn't "we are getting close to a deal here", it was "I doubt they will accept this proposal" in trade. I don't understand that, it's a second level tech that costs more beakers. And it's a monopoly for me when I run into the AI, whereas Masonry isn't a monopoly tech. I could only get Warrior Code and Pottery for Mysticism straight up in deals with 2 different AI.

In a recent run, I didn't have any luxes at all - the Russians grabbed the closest one about 15 titles away from my capital - meaning lux slider was up to 30%, hampering research. I was basically going 50 turn research on Polytheism. Also, at 1350 BC, I only had 3 cities, which is very bad start.

Colossus was hand built in the 20k city in 1350 after a temple was completed in 2500ish BC. Oracle would complete about 630 BC without further shields per turn. It would only be 7 culture per turn @1000 BC and I'm nowhere close to the Republic slingshot. It's 18 turns to complete Polytheism even with the Oracle! I would assume Poly would get me some techs, but this is looking bad.

 

[Bartleby]

One thing I am running in to is that Mysticism *isn't even worth Masonry* to the AI.

Maybe they're already researching Mysticism themselves, that'll lower the value depending how far they've got.
.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Maybe they're already researching Mysticism themselves, that'll lower the value depending how far they've got.
.

I had just traded the Russians CB for 10 gold and therefore they weren't researching Mysticism. Then this:

I don't get it - at least CivAssist says that Mysticism and Masonry are of equal value.

 

[Spoonwood]

I had just traded the Russians CB for 10 gold and therefore they weren't researching Mysticism. Then this:

View attachment 694537
I don't get it - at least CivAssist says that Mysticism and Masonry are of equal value.

They know someone else who knows Mysticism. They have a scout and free units to make contacts quickly.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Just tried a run with the Byzantines on a coastal location and it still took me 50 turns to research Writing on max. I only had 2 cities, but I did have a good river for commerce. Neither of the 2 civs I had contact with had Alphabet after 45 turns.

The price of research on Huge maps is really hard to deal with to get science going/ an SGL.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Just played until about 400 AD a game with the Byzantines at the Huge Demigod level. It was the continuation of the game that took 50 turns to research Writing. Finished the Colossus in 1950 BC and I managed to hit Philosophy first and got an SGL, which I used to rush the Great Library in 1050 BC when I chose Literature as second tech. I was able to tech trade pretty rapidly and my free tech was Feudalism, which at least 2 of the civs were willing to pay me 80 gpt for. I was second on Theology and, surprisingly, Printing Press. After Great Library, my capital was able to get Maus and Hanging Gardens before 10 AD and then we got Sistine in 280 AD. Culture wise, I was at 14 cpt at 1000BC (not bad, with Colossus about to double), but only 39 @ 10 AD, where I needed to be above 42. 25 shields per turn in the capital was OK(5 forests, 6 bgs and a grassland cow). But the Sun Tzu's cascade took out Cope, and I had no pre-build for Shakes.

The huge, huge problem is that I didn't have ANY food bonuses outside the capital and I had only 4 cities at 1000 BC and my empire is too small to wage war or research effectively. I am abandoning now since my attempted war against the Chinese is going badly, having lost my one lux city when a rush of medieval infantry took out the pikemen guarding it.

CA had me at a 1900's finish around 400 AD, which does not bode well for a 1600's finish.

The good news is that early Philosophy gives you 2 good shots at an SGL. The bad news is that you basically have to have a second city pumping settlers out reliably to get a decent empire going.

*the other good news is that MapFinder generated 250 maps for me to use!

 

[Spoonwood]

Just played until about 400 AD a game with the Byzantines at the Huge Demigod level.

Was this on pangea or archipelago? I'm fairly convinced that an archipelago map ends up better on Demigod to slow down the AIs. Well, better in the sense of more potentially powerful for finish date. There does something interesting about doing a pangea 20k on high level where you won't manage to pick every wonder you build and maybe won't get any until the industrial age.

the other good news is that MapFinder generated 250 maps for me to use!

How did you get it running? I'm interested to know, so that I might run it on my machine.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Was this on pangea or archipelago? I'm fairly convinced that an archipelago map ends up better on Demigod to slow down the AIs. Well, better in the sense of more potentially powerful for finish date. There does something interesting about doing a pangea 20k on high level where you won't manage to pick every wonder you build and maybe won't get any until the industrial age.



How did you get it running? I'm interested to know, so that I might run it on my machine.

(1) It's Pangaea. I can see the argument for archipelago inasmuch as you don't have competition for land if you have your own mini continent. Curraghs as the Byzantines are invaluable.

(2) I am probably going to write this up in a post, but here were my steps.

First, I installed Virtualbox. https://www.virtualbox.org/ It's a free utility to run virtual machines on your computer. Extremely easy to use.

Second, I installed WindowsXP in a virtual box. There are a lot of youtube tutorials on how to do this, I used this one:

MAKE SURE YOU GIVE THE VIRTUAL MACHINE AT LEAST 8 GB OF DISK SPACE. I had to re-do this when my first attempt only had 4 GB.

Third, you need to install Firefox v. 18 on your virtual machine. Once you load Firefox 18 on, you can go to mozilla.org and download a modern version (ignore safety warnings). XP comes with an old browser that just won't work with modern website. There are videos on how to do this.

Fourth, go to Civfanatics through Firefox and download MapFinder on to your local machine.

Fifth, download a local backup version of Civ III from GOG Galaxy (you get one when you buy it) and install it on your VM.

THE BEST WAY I've found to put files on the virtual XP machine is to create a folder that goes between your virtual machine and your normal machine. You download the file from GOG into this folder and it appears on you virtual machine. There is a "Shared Folder" function on VirtualBox that makes this easy. It's also a good place to dump your MapFinder maps so they are available on the machine where you are running Civ III normally.

 

[Spoonwood]

I can see the argument for archipelago inasmuch as you don't have competition for land if you have your own mini continent. Curraghs as the Byzantines are invaluable.

That's part of it. The other part lies in that the AIs won't have as good as research, so they can't build medieval wonders as easily.

Thanks for the information/directions there!

 

[Spoonwood]

Second, I installed WindowsXP in a virtual box.

I downloaded virtualbox, but got tripped on the 2nd step. How did you get WindowsXP?

 

[BlackBetsy]

@Spoonwood - the youtube video has a link to the site where you can download an ISO, which you load on the virtual machine. Look at the notes of the youtube video for the link and the product license key.

 

[BlackBetsy]

I've got an interesting Demigod 20k game going. I got a SGL with Writing, built the Pyramids, which made building a bunch of cities a lot easier, and then hit another SGL with Construction, which I somehow hit first. I held on to the SGL while I built Hanging Gardens and then used it for Sistine Chapel in BC. Right now I've got:

Palace 4000 BC
Colossus 1790 BC
Pyramids 1750 BC
Temple 1575 BC
Great Library 825 BC (triggered despotic golden age)
Library 750 BC
Colosseum 630 BC
Hanging Gardens 330 BC
[Anarchy]
Cathedral 190 BC
Sistine Chapel 110 BC

We were at 11 culture per turn @ 1000 BC but are going to emerge @ 10AD with 44 culture per turn. We've got a Shakespeare pre-build going right now and the AI are funding 90% research even though I have the Great Library. We missed Maus in a cascade that forced us to Hanging Gardens. Couldn't grab the Great Lighthouse or the Great Wall.

We have a big enough civ to go to war to grab territory to make research even better, and our lands are very green and verdant. Look at the capital with just 2 sea squares! It's not terribly productive, as I am just squeezing out 22 shields per turn. Note the 3 silks within the capital's territory, which are throwing off a lot of commerce. 90 beakers per turn before Copes or even a University.

 

[Spoonwood]

I got XP downloaded it seems. But when I try to run it in Virtual Box, it just gives me the first blue screen and I can't go through the installation.

 

[BlackBetsy]

I got XP downloaded it seems. But when I try to run it in Virtual Box, it just gives me the first blue screen and I can't go through the installation.

The steps in that video worked perfectly for me. I literally would pause the video so I could work side by side and do the next step. I wonder if it is a cursor / keyboard capture issue? Were you within the frame of the virtual machine trying to click next / F8 to accept the license?

 

[BlackBetsy]

Also, I'll return Bartleby's favor to me if you have some maps you want to generate, I can run it. I have 250 for the scenario that I'm on and thats WAYYYY more than I need.

I'm thinking about looking for a 4 cow map for a milk game or domination game.

 

[Spoonwood]

The steps in that video worked perfectly for me. I literally would pause the video so I could work side by side and do the next step. I wonder if it is a cursor / keyboard capture issue? Were you within the frame of the virtual machine trying to click next / F8 to accept the license?

Yes, I was within the frame trying to click F8. But, I couldn't see a cursor inside of that box. Just a blue screen.