[BTS] BOTM 183: Relive SGOTM - Final Spoiler - Game submitted

[nocho]

First time I submit an incompleted game. Didn't manage to beat it when SGOTM, didn't beat it for a lack of time as BOTM either.

Very tough game for monarch. Joining the bud lovefest made things a whole lot easier than the SGOTM, but then still due to the ingenious map setup tough game for conquest as I planned to. Finally managed to gobble up the whole ring (Japan, Egypt, Babylon, Zulu, Mongols in that order) which already took loads of real life time. Then wanted to take down the team before a final assault on the English. Forgot about their defensive pact though, so faced the remaining AIs together when I had to retire. English were still at tech parity or actually slightly beyond. Crazy tech capability Liz had for monarch. She also regularly stole expensive techs from me (electricity for example). Also the oil situation was a set back. Hadn't noticed it missing until having combustion and well on my way to flight and radio for bombers (wanted to do cavs+bombers). Inmediately detoured to plastics for the Oil corps and abandoned communist paradise. Liz was actually a turn sooner to plastics but luckily didn't found the corp. Submitted an incomplete game in 1700AD, I think I'd probably win it with an extra 10 hours or so, which is normally the time I have for a whole game! Anyway, the in-game date would probably have been somewhere well into the 19th century.

Anyway, very nice and challenging game, thanks for letting us relive it, neil! At least this time I ended up seeing the whole map!

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Why didn't Jimmy Thunder get a Gold Medal pinned to that Green Ambulance? The GOTM Medals and Awards page says it goes to the "Highest Final Score"; it doesn't say anything about actually having to win the game!

Now, the Cow, which I mentioned earlier, would be out of contention, since that does say "Highest Winning Base Score"

Pedant!

But yes, there is an implicit understanding that the medals go to the highest winning scores. Maybe the awards page needs to be clarified. Just for the sake of pedants.

 

[MarleysGh0st]

Maybe the awards page needs to be clarified. Just for the sake of pedants.

I'm a pedant who want a gold medal ambulance for this game!

 

[Kaitzilla]

So I started playing this one and once I met Hamaraugawa, I started having post-traumatic-stress flashbacks.
OH IT'S THIS GAME!!!
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/sgotm-15-kakumeika.451560/page-198#post-11510269


Gritting my teeth, I vowed to trash all the Gawas with extreme prejudice.
Did my usual city gifting trick when I don't care about the diplo consequences to wipe out tons of whip anger.
It backfired in Pataliputra!

Spoiler :

Then later I double built Pyramids, and taking 1 extra turn for even more fail gold, I lost the Pyramids in 500BC.
Played until 1AD ish until I realized I had to give away my Buddhist cities to keep an AP win from occuring for the Gawas.


This game gradually reminded me how the Gawas ruined the only chance to ever get Gold over the Ducks. (Other than joining them)
Mapmaker was a genius on this one.

 

[WastinTime]

This game gradually reminded me how the Gawas ruined the only chance to ever get Gold over the Ducks.

It was a moral victory since our strategy had them beaten them badly--16 turns! which as you know is an eternity in SGotM. But IIRC at ~0.01% chance of a city flipping cost us 10 turns and then rushing to finish and another 0.01% demand from the AI cost another 10 turns. (waiting for voting on AP) Well played the other 99.9999% of the game (by my team--not me, I didn't participate a whole lot on this one)

 

[neilmeister]

While this game originally had no winners, I manually changed the results to reflect that MarleysGh0st actually won a diplo vote on the last turn.... therefore technically winning even if the game didn't automatically award the win.

This was a bug caused by my design with a team.

 

[neilmeister]

So I started playing this one and once I met Hamaraugawa, I started having post-traumatic-stress flashbacks.
OH IT'S THIS GAME!!!
Mapmaker was a genius on this one.

Thanks Kaitzilla.... I immodestly admit I was very proud of it.

 

[MarleysGh0st]

While I've been waiting for BOTM 186, I decided to replay this game for fun. I started from a save in 520 AD, when in the previous attempt I made a futile play for a cultural win. This time, I continued funding my science and building my economy, while looking for a diplomatic wedge to break up Elizagawa's lovefest. I still had a close call in the AP, after surpassing the Team to become the second candidate for religious victory votes, but in the end this turned out much better than my first, official game.

 

[Tobiyogi]

Must have lost somewhere between 1600 and 1650 AD. Diplo victory for Mansa/Hyana, everyone voted for them (exept me).
I was in really good shape, leader in score (second place after the "Team"), in tech and in military. People really hated me because I stayed Hindu all the time, but I could demand tribute whenever I wanted. It was like Always War with a strong diplomatic side. Tokugawa was down, Hammuaragawa would have been next. As I hate to conquer the world (and to manage all the new cities), I would have gone space. I was close to Electricity / Superconductors and all that stuff like Oberservatories, Iron Works, Oxford, Banks, Mausoleums, etc... were already in place.

Spoiler Score in 1600 AD :

Couple of questions: Why are Mansa/Hyana so big? Why can't I reach them? Why voted everyone for them? (do they have a diplo bonus?) Why do they lead the score with poor techs and no wonders?
All those advantages seem a bit too "constructed" for me, but still a great game. Thanks for the map!!

I got two guys into Hindu (for a couple of turns) before they notoriously switched back. But it was enough to open borders and bribe on someone. So a chain reaction took place, where even other "Tokus" declared on each other. It was not too difficult to mess up relations, most of the folks did not have OB with each other after permanently giving them techs for "stop trading with"...

Spoiler Relation screen 1600 AD :

 

[MarleysGh0st]

Couple of questions: Why are Mansa/Hyana so big? Why can't I reach them? Why voted everyone for them? (do they have a diplo bonus?) Why do they lead the score with poor techs and no wonders?
All those advantages seem a bit too "constructed" for me, but still a great game.

The Team had all those advantages because neilmeister is an evil genius!

I don't think they had any special diplomatic bonuses, aside from the shared religion, but because they were so remote they never went to war with anyone else, and so never accumulated any negatives for attacking AI or their friends. In my game, Elizagawa was the rival of the Team on the diplomatic front.

Yes, making these two a team was a rather artificial decision. How could they act together when, by the mechanics of the game, they theoretically couldn't even make contact with each other from their isolated lands until one of them had airships? But that's what made this game such a surprising challenge!

 

[Tobiyogi]

Besides those (for my taste) overpowered team-players, I really enjoyed the map. It's definitely the idea of an evil genius to put you on a map with tons of Tokugawas while one of them is normally enough to reck your nerves

I like how you can mess up relations between them, at least to some extent, not completely. Eventually they will stick together. I continued to play after my diplo loss, just because the game was nice so far. I conquered also Hamuragawa and Shakagawa, but then I was crushed by Hatty and Eliza who had been plotting for milleniums already. Oh well....

I could have gone for Space with much more focus, build the Internet, consolidate my borders, and the lean back. But as usual, I followed a stupid double strategy, something between conquest and research.