BOTM 19 First Spoiler

[mtt9999]

Wow.

I got stomped this game. my biggest flaw??

bee-lined Machinery from Oracle to whip up with some Crossbows against heavily-meleed AI's... rather successful but then I just stopped expansion. In this game for some reason I only settled 'perfect' spots for about 4 cities, instead of founding 3-4 great cities and an additional 3-4 mediocre cities. My military is greatly outnumbered by the production capacity of all the other AI's, thus I am losing perpetual warfare against big armies, even with better techs...

I'm not dead yet but have given up, GOTM44 to look forward to. I normally don't lose on monarch but this is my second of three monarch games in a row I have lost (with the exception of the desert game).

oh well. bring on GOTM 44!!
oh well.

 

[Gosha190]

Jesusin

1 city, pop5, 3fpt, 8hpt, 39bpt. 3Warrior, 2Worker. 22h towards library, 2f in the box, half of Maths researched. Can you improve this?

my real 2520BC:

1 city, pop 5, 0fpt, 11hpt (capital is producing settler), 39 bpt, Math=78/373, finished production: 2 warriors, worker, 2 wb. Unfinished Barracks 4/50, settler 35/100. Food box=7/30. 1 forest chopped into the second wb.

If I'll change settler to lib:
3fpt,8hpt,39bpt, rest will not change.

To my mind we have similar results But I agree - yours way is much better for a peaceful game

 

[BLubmuz]

Contender save.
Aim: a good SS victory.
I was satisfied with my game until i started to post here and seen Gosha's post.
Damn Russian , how can he be so fast? My start was very similar to his, but the results are different. Anyway...

The Opening

Spoiler :

Settled in place, worker first while researching fishing. Then Hunting > AH. A mistake, probably, Myst > Poly > PH > writing, Math, CoL.
Usually i research CoL before Math, but:
First meet was with Charlie, damn him and my scouting warrior seen unimproved ivory. Charlie starts with hunting, soon or later... parked there. Finally a worker showed on the hill, next turn he was on ivory, declared, stolen, send unescorted home.
The warrior followed him until he can safely continue scouting, direction NNW. Hut! BW from it. That's why i started math before CoL.
Met Shaka's scout, peace with Charlie, for now.
Zulu borders, with a worker sleeping on copper. Stolen, send home while roading the hill, then the jungle.
Warrior on a hill, Hut! Panther! popped hut for a small cash, survived to panther, C1. Heal, watching the copper. Shaka smoked something, sent a worker to road to his second city. Stolen, finish the road to Ulundi.

Timbuktu builds (after my first and only worker built in all the game): WB, warrior, warrior, settler, WB, WB. Then Barracks and chariots, more chariots.
Djenne founded in 2400 BC, 1 NE of horses, started Oracle.

Third WB went south, HC has to be somewhere north.

I met all AIs in the BC, so i think it's not spoilerish talk about them.
My WB found a passage south, arriving to an icy island where it met a WB of the first "overseas" AI. Hundred years later, spotted his borders, few turns later spotted the ones of the last AI. Both were pleased or friendly all the game and good trading patners.

Back to Shaka.
Quickly sent a chariot to help the warrior, trying to deny copper to Shaka. Parked both in the jungle outside his borders and every other turn the chariot goes north to watch the copper, then back in the jungle.
When i has a force of 9 more chariots (one more in my borders), sent them to the hill near Ulundi and moved the first one and the warrior inside the borders.
Ulundi was watched by 4 archers, my first 4 chriots suicided, but next 4 won! Ulundi was mine. Then i captured some worker around, killed an archer. Peace next turn for Agri, pottery and masonry.
Met Alex... nice company, no doubt.
At least, he gave me IW for Poly+Wri.
Let's see: Shaka is well known, Alex is even worse. HC is basically aggressive, despite his new traits and Charlie usually declares after he finished his expansion, or after he reaches Feud.

Now i got my plan: clean the continent and try to launch before 1800.

Phase Two.

Spoiler :

Shaka sent the classical couple of archers + settler to found a city near to ivory and corn, let an archer alone in his new capital.
But we're still at peace. Anyway, i moved the chariots in the forest, to arrive there in the same turn i declare.
2 turns to wait... peace treaty gone, still an archer alone... go! 3 died, but the fourth took it! And both cities came with granary. And the fifth captured another worker.
In the meantime, founded KS and Gao in a somewhat straight line to north.

Then, masterpiece of MM: once Ulundi was size 3 i put a scientist at work (no library, but i'm running Caste) and once at size 4 i put 3 sci at work, starving a bit and MM to avoid loss of population.
Djenne built the GW, then a temple.
In 575 BC my first GS was born in Ulundi, beating Djenne for 1 turn and founding an Academy in Timbuktu 3 turns later. Then i put a priest at work in Djenne and grow Ulundi, obviuosly cottaged any FP there.
The GProphet for the Confu Shrine was born in 175 BC, right when i finished Engineering.
No peace with Shaka.
An exploring chariot popped a hut guarded by a warrior, nothing good IIRC. But the good new was a barb city on the coast right S of uMung.

Phase three

Spoiler :

Self researched calendar (in BtS is a precious tech), but traded for sailing, aestetics, Mono, monarchy and later HBR with the overseas AIs.

3 maces and a cat, backed up by 2 chariots (one medic, my GG super healer later) where enough to finish Shaka, no losses, worker there. Once healed, moved to Etruscan (the barb city) and took, this time lost the cat, worker there too.
Kept a mace there, moved the remaining 2 to Gao: HC time is coming. I squeezed a library and some basic structure in Timbuctu, but mainly i was building military.

Phase four

Spoiler :

The empire was quite large and i have to sacrifice some research to overexpansion, but i can't wait, or i have to face longbows.
I've seen an Incan city in a island north, so i built a galley and a trireme.
Assembled a decent stack, started the war with HC in 325 AD, finished him in 580 AD.

Highlights:
First war with Charlie in 3440 BC
First war with Shaka in 2640 BC
Oracle for CS in 1600 BC (Djenne)
Academy in Timbuctu 500 BC
Great wall 850 BC (Djenne)
Pyramids 425 BC (Timbuktu)
Zulu out in 25 BC
HG 175 AD (Ulundi)
Engineering 175 BC, Optics in 500 AD. But founded Christianity and Tao before it.
War with HC 325 to 580 AD.

To be continued...

 

[BLubmuz]

I delayed a lot the library, to build chariots. Mistake? maybe.
Anyway, in 500 AD, my stats:

- 4 cities founded (including Capital)
- 3 from Shaka,
- 3 from HC (to be accurate the 3rd was captured in 560 AD), the first i took (right north of Timbuktu) autorazed and i razed the one on the island.
- 1 city from barbs.

Total 11 cities, can't remember population, but well developed and structured.

I never considered to settle on the islands, until very late in the game, when i settled a city in a resource rich island in the south pole. But this is for the last spoiler.

 

[Ribannah]

CHALLENGER
... and no working stealing

The challenger disadvantage is huge in this game. Settled one south in part because that removed one jungle, thereby reducing the chance of being overgrown. Ages later, tin appeared on the starting hill, so it all worked out for the best.

The Warrior went clockwise and found several huts, which brought us a map (revealing more huts, yeah!), a Scout, and one tech: Sailing. Not bad. We found all four rivals on our continent quickly, but it took a long time before we discovered the southern polar route towards the remaining two civs.

Decided to go straight for Alphabet (via Pottery) and to skip Bronze Working (the advantage of having your forests changed into jungle: there is little to chop). Alphabet arrived in 2040bc. An alternative was to go for Judaism to compensate for the missing happy face from Gold; that would make for a cultural game but I didn't want that.

A Worker was built right away (1 + 15 turns, instead of 12, for leaving the hilltop) and went farming first, rather than prioritizing a fast workboat. Let the city grow to size 6 before we started on a Settler.

Djenne was founded southwest on the same river, and that was it since the Oracle had to be built; also, barbarians were plentiful in the north.

After 1000bc, our empire quickly grew to 6 good cities: first on two islands (planning the southern one to become our Moai Statues city), and then two more on the continent, when the north was cleared from barbs, claiming gold and copper/marble.

To get the marble, we culture-bombed northern Niani as that was the only peaceful way to push back the Inca border.

Zulu war
We were friendly to everyone until out of the blue Shaka declared and approached Djenne with a stack of mostly Impi. This however happened right after we got the copper connected and Machinery researched. Our rushed Macemen quickly dispatched with the Zulu attackers and, now promoted, eventually went on to capture Ulundi, with Stonehenge, Pyramids and Hanging Gardens, in 475ad, in time to switch to Representation with Banking coming up shortly.

In 500ad, we have 9 cities, and one Settler on a long trip around the world to the islands east that are just out of direct reach. Shortly, we will target the boxed-in Inca who hopefully have some Great People incorporated in their capital by now.


Towns
3960bc Timbuktu (rice, banana, clams, 3 gems), 1 south of start
1800bc Djenne (corn, cow, spices, gems), southwest on the same river
900bc Kumbi Saleh (2 fish), island east
575bc Gao (fish, clams), island south
575bc Walata (rice, cow, gold), northwest on the long river
350bc Niani (cow, copper, marble), north of Walata on the same river
325ad kwaDakuza (floodplains), helper city northeast of Ulundi (captured from Shaka)
475ad Awdaghost (iron), 3 tiles north of Timbuktu
475ad Ulundi (cow, gems, copper, stone), captured Zulu capital

Timbuktu builds
3360bc Worker
2600bc Workboat
2440bc Warrior
2200bc Worker
1840bc Settler
1680bc Lighthouse
1240bc THE ORACLE
1120bc Granary
975bc Galley
825bc Library
700bc Academy (Great Scientist)
600bc Settler
550bc Mint
525bc Confucian Monastery
425bc Settler
375bc Confucian Missionary
300bc Worker
150bc THE TEMPLE OF ARTEMIS
1ad COLOSSUS
50ad Harbor
200ad THE GREAT LIBRARY
325ad Market
450ad University

Other builds
250ad THE KONG MIAO (Djenne, Great Prophet)
450ad THE HEROIC EPIC (Walata); Theology (trade)

A Great General was born in the island town of Gao and by 500ad has not yet arrived at Walata....

Research
3600bc Agriculture
3400bc Fishing; Sailing (hut)
3120bc Pottery
2600bc Writing
2040bc Alphabet; Hunting, Animal Husbandry, Bronze Working, Mysticism (trade)
2000bc Archery, Meditation (trade)
1960bc Priesthood
1480bc Code of Laws (Confucianism in Djenne)
1280bc Iron Working (trade)
1240bc Mathematics; Civil Service (Oracle)
1160bc Polytheism
1120bc Masonry
1000bc Monotheism
825bc Currency
650bc Metal Casting
575bc Aesthetics
525bc Literature
425bc Music (-> Great Artist, bombs Niani to get to the marble)
350bc Monarchy (trade)
250bc Machinery
50bc Paper
1ad Compass
100ad Optics
150ad Drama (hut)
200ad Calendar (trade)
325ad Education
350ad Construction (AI wouldn't trade)
450ad Engineering


STATS

1000bc score 303, 2 cities, 11 pop, 1 wonder, 59 sustainable beakers
1ad score 615, 6 cities, 31 pop, 3 wonders, 172 sustainable beakers
500ad score 1056, 9 cities, 60 pop, 9 wonders (6 built, 3 captured), 300 sustainable beakers