BOTM 04 First Spoiler

I found empty Gil capital and declared war to him. Next turn there was warrior-defender and my warrior lost battle (at 3% for win :D). Next turn my capital was captured.

This same situation happened to me, except he didn't build a defender so I destroyed him. It was an extremely risky and probably stupid move on my part as well because he did have a warrior 2 tiles from my undefended city by the time I took his city. So if he had built a warrior in the 2 turns it took me to take him out I would have lost also.

Even with that string of events working in my favor I think it ended up hurting me in the long run. I struggled with filling in cities and keeping my economy under control. I also lost an early city to barbarians. Taking him out later in the game would have worked out better.

The starting continent wasn't very good. There were not nearly enough different resources and not enough bonus food. My cities were pretty spread out in order to have their own food resources which didn't help maintenance costs.

My research pace was very slow and I didn't research alphabet (expecting not to get techs from Sitting Bull). I just remember back in original civ4 that Mansa Musa was the only one that would trade techs with you if you were his only contact. Tech trading seems to be a lot different in BtS from what I remember of the original game. Sitting Bull did end up researching Alphabet, though, and I noticed I could trade with him, but it didn't really help much anyway since his tech pace was just as slow as mine.

So at 500AD I stood a long way from optics. I had 7 cities, 2 of which were still pretty useless. No wonders, no great people.

Sorry I didn't take any notes this game or I'd go into more specifics. I'll try to for the next one.

edit: I'm playing contender.
 
I tried the warrior rush this month cause I didn't do it last month and regretted that...

I trained 3 warriors and assaulted Sum's capitol with 4 warriors against 1. Disgusted with my luck I abandoned the game after my first 3 attacks failed to make a dent in the warrior. Obivously my last warrior lost too...

:cry:
If the first doesn't do any damage: stop. The RNG is against you this turn, but most likely the defending Warrior won't be promoted yet from this one kill. Try again when you have a new fourth Warrior present, or six against two, or revert to repeated Worker stealing. Meanwhile, don't forget to defend your own capital. :)
 
My research pace was very slow and I didn't research alphabet (expecting not to get techs from Sitting Bull). I just remember back in original civ4 that Mansa Musa was the only one that would trade techs with you if you were his only contact. Tech trading seems to be a lot different in BtS from what I remember of the original game. Sitting Bull did end up researching Alphabet, though, and I noticed I could trade with him
What is different in this game is that Sitting Bull does know more civs than just you -- the fact that you know him is because the original save file was botched. If you were, in fact, the only civ to be in contact with him then he would probably not trade techs with you.

Has anybody tried to tech trade with Gilgamesh? I assume he did not want to trade.
 
Having killed off Gilgamesh in 2800 BC, we barely knew each other.

I wonder if having him around as a free worker factory would be worth it. I devoted 4 warriors, losing one, to knock him out and take his capital city. After that, I could devote my strategy to expanding cities, research, and gold. I had no need to build additional military.

Odds are, that influenced a difference in our city settling. I settled cities based on gold/science. If you didnt kill of gilga, then you had to have a few more production cities
 
Has anybody tried to tech trade with Gilgamesh? I assume he did not want to trade.

Moderator Action: Suspected post-500 AD info deleted

Please do not post information that is outside the allowed range, as defined in the first post.
 
Contender.

First one of these GOTM things I've ever did. I'd say Emperor is my normal difficulty but I don't want too much of a workout so I take the
standard start. Decide to found the capital 1W of start to give a later city room to work the corn and 1 gold as the capital will from time to time need to not work one or either so it can grow.

Nothing screams "Civil Service slingshot!" like 2 golds immediately and marble at a 2nd city site (I settled 1NE of the eastern pigs for my 2nd city and grabbed the corn with the 3rd to make sure Gilgamesh wouldn't get the marble). I never tried to oracle CS until very recently in RBCiv's Epic 18, where I stumbled into it at 470BC. So I was pretty confident I could get it here (that other game was on Monarch). I researched CoL and finished the Oracle simultaneously on 800something BC. I ran 3 scientists with Caste System at the pig/marble site for an early academy; in 380BC the capital was up to 96 beakers/turn at size 7, almost as good (or broken) as Sulla's demonstration on his website (http://www.garath.net/Sullla/csarticle.html for those interested.)

In 290BC Gilgy is kind enough to build the temple of artemis for me. I've finished construction and machinery is due before the AD turnover; a few maces and catapults should ravage him. I get the herbalism event and take the full option, avoiding the pop loss. The happiness slows me down a but I think it's worth it.

80BC - In the "you're kidding me" category, Gilgamesh build the great lighthouse, a wonder I had been hoping to chop out. Fantastic!
At 190AD I attack with 5 maces, 6 cats and 2 veteran axes.
Gilgy is cute and goes on the attack, allowing me to kill several vultures outside the city. I take the capital in 260AD.

After this point I didn't take detailed notes so I won't say what happened (I did not pause the war and it was still going at 500AD). Suffice it to say that with cats+maces vs. vultures, archers, and chariots, the future does not look bright for Gilgamesh. At this point I was also really looking forward to abusing Uruk; I've only recently improved my play to the point of going after a dedicated GP farm and Uruk is by far the best location for one I've seen yet in a game.
 
I thought I was doing ok until I read the spoilers. Built a few cities and beelined construction to take out Gilgamesh, this started at 10ad and was still going strong at 500ad.

Warrior rush? Never even occured to me!

CS slingshot? Didn't occur to me either!
 
Playing Contender and going for a conquest win, the one victory type I have never achieved.

Early Development
I decided to take a risk and move SWSW to start. What I found there surprised me, it was coastal! It was better than desert but not as good as I had hoped. An extra hills tile was present to the south and it did make and excellent city site in the long term. I followed my plan outlined in the pregame discussion. I started worker- warrior-warrior- settler while researching Agriculture, AH and BW. I go the units out relatively quickly and sent my settler to the space NE N or the start for city #2. I lost four turns settling it due to a wandering bear and only 1 escort, but finally in 2625 BC York was founded. Settler # 2 was finished in 2325 BC and settled 1 square west of the copper making a canal through the narrow isthmus of our continent.


The Sumerian Wars

I quickly made contact with Gilgamesh and found his capital to the east. I posted my first worker outside his boarders and started a war to worker steal in 3275 BC. Once that worker was safely home I moved my warrior through his boarders, scouting his excellent capital site and seeing he still had only warriors. The warrior moved south of his boarders and found the two key copper tiles to the south of Gilgamesh. At this point I made peace and set up for another worker steal, using the warrior to the south of the Uruk to keep tabs on the copper, no copper= no vultures. In 2275 BC I completed another worker steal and made peace in 1880 BC. In 1500 BC Gilgamesh settled a second city, uruk near one of the southern coppers and in 1500 BC he sent two workers out to mine it. I declared war again and worker stole his two workers (4 total now). At this point I was churning out axes and whipped out his wandering warriors and moved near his capitals and pillaged his horses, leaving him with 2 chariots and 2 warriors in his capital apparently he had not researched archery yet! With 5 or so axemen I took uruk in 1000BC. By the time I got to Eridu though he had two archers solidly fortified, so I had to wait for construction and catapults to finish the job. Summeria was finished in 230 BC.

Consolidation and set up for conquest.
I decided at this point to continue with my conquest goal but do it in a way similar to what was suggested by somebody (Jericho Hill Maybe?) to focus on using my UU (redcoats) to take over the rest of the world and make a large collection of colonial states; to win a conquest by Vassalization. Till 500 AD the focus on the big plan was to settle key points on my continent and set up infrastructure to get to rifling and astronomy as quickly as possible. I settled two major cities in the jungle to take advantage of the ivory and the silk? That was present. I also expanded through the rest of the western arm of the continent. I got to optics in 265 AD and set out caravels at this point. During this time was traded a lot with sitting bull. I actually got Alphabet from him and continued to trade for about 6 techs through him, which helped speed things up a bit. By planning to use redcoats I doubt I will get the fastest time or best score, but it should be fun to crush civs left in the technological dust with firearms when the time comes, but that is the next spoiler

Research
Spoiler :
Agriculture 3700 BC
Animal Husbandry 3275BC
Bronze Working 2825 BC
Mysticism 2550 BC
The Wheel 2350 BC
Pottery 2200 BC
Meditation 2025 BC
Priesthood 1850 BC
Writing 1575 BC
Code of Laws 1100 BC found Confu
Philosophy 1050 BC Oracle (mistake, I thought I could get civil service)
Mathmatics 775 BC
Masonery 700 BC
Construction 410 BC
Sailing 350 BC
Aeshtics 230 BC
PolyTheism 200 BC
Literature 140 BC
Iron Working 65 BC
Hunting 50 BC Trade: sitting bull
Alphabet 5 BC Trade
Archery 5 BC Trade
Metal Casting 85 AD
Calender 175 AD trade
Compass 250 AD
Machinery 265 AD Great Scientist
Optics 265 AD Great Scientist
Monotheism 295 AD
Monarchy 355 AD Trade
Currency 505 AD



Wonders
Oracle 1075 BC
Kong Mao 425 BC
Great Library 20 BC (uruk)
Parthenon 205 AD
Musuem of M 475 AD
 
I posted earlier that the big difference this game was going to be between those who took out Gilgamesh early and those who didn't. I stand corrected. The big difference is going to be between those who took out Gilgamesh and did an Oracle CS Slingshot and traded early and often with sitting Bull, and those of us (like myself) who merely did one or two of the above.

I look forward to the final spoilers so I can see just how badly I've been beaten. :)
 
I intended to do a CS sling shot but forgot to research mathmatics, i ended up with Philosophy instead. Oops:crazyeye:
 
:eek: May I ask about a more detailed spoiler, please?
He elaborates in later exchanges, jesusin.

I posted earlier that the big difference this game was going to be between those who took out Gilgamesh early and those who didn't. I stand corrected. The big difference is going to be between those who took out Gilgamesh and did an Oracle CS Slingshot and traded early and often with sitting Bull, and those of us (like myself) who merely did one or two of the above.

I look forward to the final spoilers so I can see just how badly I've been beaten. :)
Alas I did CS sling, & though I didn't take out Gil til late BC, I never let him expand beyond city & harvested workers from him (which I consider the preferred option to taking him out immediately) ... however I did not try trading with SB until after reading about it here (well after 500ad), so count me (by my count) as 2 out of 3. Having to wait so long to get astro (or foreign trade routes) really left me stuck in neutral for a long time :(
 
It happened unintentionally during my editing of the map. After trying and failing a couple of times to get rid of it, I 'strategically' decided it would make for an interesting Easter egg (it is Easter after all), so left it in.

I was disgusted by the Palanthir connection. I am glad to hear it wasn't intentional. Anyway, I think it should have been mentioned in the pregame thread. Specially this being a Prince game, where new people come here to learn.

A Random Event (a wedding) happened between the unexpectedly known civ and another civ I can't mention here, so I knew he would trade techs. I went for Alpha and traded a bit, but it wasn't such an important factor. What was I expecting to trade from Prince AI anyway?
 
For a long time i assumed there was some reason we had contact with Sitting Bull. I knew he had negihbors because of his espionage pt usuage early.

For a while I though that maybe he was set up as a super oppenent with a wikedly advantagous starting spot a big GP farm and a billion protective archers. But that turned out not to be the case.
 
jesusin, challenger. Goal: fastest cultural.

Settled in place and no 1W because I valued more the health from the trees than the additional cottages. I am glad with my decission.
Appart from the usual plans I had, I noted not to forget an early Academy, an early exploring WB and the CS slingshot (Prince level and 2 gold start made it mandatory). But I forgot...

Researched Agg-AH-Mining-BW.
Took the 3 wandering barbs threat very seriously and built War first. War-Wor-War-War-Set. They never came. There was a loss in Gilga power and I found a wounded Barb War W, so I guess he lost his explorer against the 3 barbs and that Prince is so easy that barbs even don't know how to heal.
I think it is worth mentioning that I grew to size 3 before settler in order to be working the 3 supertiles (pig, gold, gold).

At turn 12 I took a very difficult decission regarding Gilga. Archery to take him? 4 Warriors at his doors in 30 turns? I decided against all that and kept growing. By the way, after so much thinking I forgot to leave everything as it was, so I lost a full turn. Arggg.
Worker stole him and then, knowing that his borders would pop again soon and he would be able to improve his lands with a new Worker, I fortified and stayed at war with him.

Decided to use my first Settler on a half decent site W to connect the copper and Axe rushed Gilga. I built a road to Uruk, 8 Axes where more than enough even against protective Archers on a hill 60% culture bonus capital. Uruk immediately started its library to prepare to be my GPFarm.

Axe rush+Oracle building means no Library in capital, so very late slingshot (950BC). I founded Confu on the way.

I built my library and hired scientists in capital (mistake). I got a GPro (35% chances) instead of a GS. This was huge. I had thought it wouldn't mind so much, as a single GP GAge can be triggered and used to change civics without anarchy. But then I realized that, being isolated, a new religion would save much more turns than a GAge so I kept it for Theolo.


Cities:
capital on spot (Legendary)
copper+clams W (war and auxiliary city)
Uruk (GPFarm and Legendary)
pigs+corn+shared clams E (secondary GPFarm)
corn, pig, 2sugar, marble, copper (Legendary)
stone, copper, pigs, clams W (auxiliary)
corn, pigs, clams, sugar far S (secondary GPFarm)

There is so much food int his map that I considered settling 10 cities even when I was planning to build cathedrals only in 2 cities (too late Pottery for a 3 cottage city cultural game).

Random Events: thousands of them, even in consecutive turns. Monsoon showed me the option of losing a pop instead of building grayed out, so I couldn't chose it, why???? Than I lost a single building instead of two, why??? I had the +2health herbalists thing, losing pop and adding 2 temporary unhappiness, which was very good, but really ill-timed, the turn after I had revolted to slavery. Happiness was a problem for a long time after that.

I judged SH a waste at the time, specially due to the GPro points, but as I setted to maximize food in the fatcrosses it was hard to grow borders. Who knows.


BANKRUPT: At 1AD I was bankrupted. I don't understand why. This is so different from Vanilla! 7 cities doesn't look like too much, does it? It is true that I had no cottages going. Maybe not having foreign trade routes has an influence too. Anyway, I didn't expect it.
Please help me, has city maintenance changed in BTS compared to Vanilla?

So here I am. +12gpt at 0%. I would like to beeline Music, I'd like to beeline Philo, I'd like to beeline Monot in order to bulb Theo. My chosen third Legendary city has zero cottages, lots of jungle and will take a lot of time to be in shape. There are a lot of 2-food-resource ioty sites available, but I won't dare to settle any more cities. Oh, and there is that Barb Galley pillaging my nets, too.
What am I doing? I am out of the competition for the fastest finish.
 
BANKRUPT: At 1AD I was bankrupted. I don't understand why. This is so different from Vanilla! 7 cities doesn't look like too much, does it? It is true that I had no cottages going. Maybe not having foreign trade routes has an influence too. Anyway, I didn't expect it.
Please help me, has city maintenance changed in BTS compared to Vanilla?

Well I guess I wasn't the only one who had trouble keeping the science rate up. But I am also at a bit of a loss as to why it was so difficult. I think they altered things so that cities off of your starting continent have especially high maintenance, but that shouldn't have been an issue at this stage.
 
BANKRUPT: At 1AD I was bankrupted. I don't understand why. This is so different from Vanilla! 7 cities doesn't look like too much, does it? It is true that I had no cottages going. Maybe not having foreign trade routes has an influence too. Anyway, I didn't expect it.
Please help me, has city maintenance changed in BTS compared to Vanilla?

So here I am. +12gpt at 0%. I would like to beeline Music, I'd like to beeline Philo, I'd like to beeline Monot in order to bulb Theo. My chosen third Legendary city has zero cottages, lots of jungle and will take a lot of time to be in shape. There are a lot of 2-food-resource ioty sites available, but I won't dare to settle any more cities. Oh, and there is that Barb Galley pillaging my nets, too.
What am I doing? I am out of the competition for the fastest finish.
I haven't really posted a complete summary, but I've hinted I also had an issue here (though not quite this bad -- I had cottages & intentionally delayed my expansion to limit the problem, and also beelined CoL & built Colossus & whipped courthouses ASAP). My reasoning was that the problem was not having any international trade routes, all my trade routes were generating 1 coin and that was really keeping commerce down. I actually realized the issue fairly quickly, but without getting lots of free techs from trade with SB up til that point, by the time I did start trading with him it wasn't much help & it took me forever to get optics & then astro.
 
BANKRUPT: At 1AD I was bankrupted. I don't understand why. This is so different from Vanilla! 7 cities doesn't look like too much, does it? It is true that I had no cottages going. Maybe not having foreign trade routes has an influence too. Anyway, I didn't expect it.
Please help me, has city maintenance changed in BTS compared to Vanilla?

So here I am. +12gpt at 0%. I would like to beeline Music, I'd like to beeline Philo, I'd like to beeline Monot in order to bulb Theo. My chosen third Legendary city has zero cottages, lots of jungle and will take a lot of time to be in shape. There are a lot of 2-food-resource ioty sites available, but I won't dare to settle any more cities. Oh, and there is that Barb Galley pillaging my nets, too.
What am I doing? I am out of the competition for the fastest finish.


This was one reason why this time I went for fewer larger cities than many cities, untile later in the game. since churchill is charasmatic it gives you two extra happy giving an extra two pop cap. I only built 3 early cities, captured two from Giglamesh and then slowly expanded into the space provided.
 
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