[BTS] BOTM 200 First Spoiler - 1AD

[Pangaea]

Finally started this mammoth, don't know if I can finish in time. The start was brutal. Very brutal. Have never played with Raging barbs before, and boy were they angry. I started like as if it was a normal game. Worker first. Hunting -> AH -> Mining -> BW (think it was like this). Improved the Ivory, the Cow and the Pigs. Then this happened and they all went *poof*

Spoiler :

Both the worker and settler had to hide in the city, behind the back of the Super Archer.

I was really close to just quitting at some point after this, though, because there are only so many 90-95% odds you can lose in a row without throwing the computer out of windows It became pretty darn obvious we needed Archery. The barbs settled down a bit after this horror of 9 invading simultaneously ("only" 5-6 afterwards, then even less), and once they spawned a few cities and other AIs expanded, they calmed down a fair bit. From the very start I tried to spawnbust, but it was pointless. The land is way too big with ice and tundra everywhere.

Eventually I did settle on the dotmap, then later to the SW and NW.

No IW yet, but it's online in 1-2 turns. Hope we have something, though copper is fine really. Have started to get out some HAs too after getting to HBR with an economy shot to smithereens from mainly unit maintenance. Axes grabbed two barb cities in the west. Think we have 7 cities. Teammate had huge problems with a barb spearman early on, who smashed all the improvements about 3 times over. Better now, and he has expanded to 5 or 6 cities. With no IW yet the land is crummy, so this has been a very messy game, but at least we're alive!

Think the plan is to declare on the Heelman with HAs and the surviving Axes. Doesn't look like he has metal, but I don't know what his interior looks like since we can't open borders. Some pretty nasty diplo stuff going on

The Adventurer chaps seem to be on a mission to build all the wonders in the world, preferably by 1AD. They've got a long list already, and are teching about 3 times faster than us (but some of that will be culture). I started out thinking maybe culture could be a way to win, despite no temples or cathedrals, but that idea got quickly shot in the face from the huge barb invasion and missing all the wonders. Marble isn't even hooked up yet (lack Masonry). Happiness is a problem with only Ivory, but eventually it should be possible to get Gems and Wine, so that will help.

Terribly frustrating start, and I had no idea they'd start streaming in so early (turn 25?). Early archery would have been good here - much better than what I did. Could have built some early archers and tried to fan out. Maybe some barbs would have died on those instead of wasting all our improvements and locking us inside the city walls. I sincerely hope the non-GW AIs had big problems too, because this was nasty.

 

[MarleysGh0st]

I took the contender save to play Zeus. When the barbs showed up, they pillaged all my improvements and definitely slowed down the pace of the game. At 1 AD, I have six cities, including two captured barb cities.

 

[Frederiksberg]

Contender save. Start was very similar to @Pangaea. Took me a while to realize that archery was unavoidable in order to expand safely so could have expanded faster with earlier archers. Next setback was missing the Oracle by two turns. In hindsight I should have whipped it when I had the opportunity. An unknown civ (The Cyclops) is getting every single wonder so far. With no trading partners outside of the backwards People of the Nile research is incredibly slow and unit maintenance is high. At 1AD Zeus commands 10 cities and is at war with the People of the Bush. Progress feels incredibly slow.