BOTM 22 Final Spoiler

[ianw1610]

I haven't won a Red Ambulance for a while, but in this game I'm a nailed-on certainty to win it!!

Tried to prioritise Research early on, and beelined for an Academy, at the expense of early REX. Indeed, there was a time when I had just 2 cities, but Churchill & Fred had already expanded to 15 & 16 cities respectively.

I did expand up to 6 cities, but some were sub-optimal, as Churchill had taken the choke-points. By this point, Churchill & Fred had 22 & 23 cities respectively. I had to set my Research slider to 0% to break even financially, so made no technological progress... my Science Academy multiplier was no use with base Science @ zero !!!

Eventually Churchill put me out of my misering by DoWing with his Knights, against my Archers and Gallic Warriors. Game Over.

 

[nealw]

yeah i noticed that in last deity game that in order to succeed diplomacy is needed

ie... getting one civ to DoW on another civ and so on....

how to build up good relations points? i know religion is one of them... gifting tech gives + 1 each turn right?

any other ways?

 

[nealw]

errr can anyone link me to a good article?

i have a feeling the people that actually win this Botm is because they got some other civ to DoW on churchill

 

[mynystry]

My first BOTM - Deity save!!

I usually never play above emperor but I wanted to give this game a try even if I knew victory was almost impossible. My objective was survival and at least I last until the end of the game, when Joao won space race victory.

I think the map was really tough, the initial location seemed really good, but the desert to the south was just backstabbing. With such few food expansion was difficult, and with Churchill relatively far I did not think about conquering him. Luckily I managed to block the two mountain passes and I got all the north of the continent for myself (until annoying Hannibal founded a crappy city in the middle of the desert with no resources or food at all).

I lost the great library for 1 turn and liberalism for 2 turns, that was the last nail in my coffin. What kept me in the game was that I was able to bulb philosophy and I got the first religion in the continent, Churchill and Frederick joined Taoism and we had a strong alliance that helped me surviving when I met the Carthaginians and the Dutch. I had a military alliance with Churchill and he was tough with his redcoats. I was never able to use my military advantage on hills with Gaelic Warriors cos Churchill and Frederick were too far, and my cities were busy trying to expand and produce science... impossible to keep with AI in Deity... anyway, it was nice to try for the first time Deity, and at least my objective of surviving was accomplished

Hats off to those that managed a victory!

 

[Simon_c]

We left wondering if I was was going to get cats to the front before CH gets longbows...

25AD: declared on Churchill. I'll probably get my ass kicked...

Well, I tried to pillage him while the cats made it to the front line, and missed. He's got longbows by turn 128 !!. It took 4 cats just to take on city, and that wasn't on a hill.
But, it's on wards or out. I've got to take london and york to be able to stand a chance of getting the economy on it's feet again.


And in summary, Nah. I caused CH some problems, but couldn't do anything to London or York.
I gave up and retired around 900ad.

 

[cfrbatt]

Third turn-in third lost was 55 out of 58 in BtS BOTM 20 Zulu, Emperor Conquest loss and 37 out of 41 in BtS BOTM 21 Portugal, Immortal Diplomatic loss.
So I made it to the 1890's. I was doing fine up till 1AD, then the slide started fell way behind in tech, power every thing
1850's I got 10 city's then Churchill DoW's damn I was friendly with him. Lose 2 city's. Two turns later Fredrick joins Churchill in the -slap Boudica back to the stone age party. Lose another city, Then Joao joins in the fun. They gots infantry I gots Muskets and maces at 10 to 1 odds. Good by cruel world.

 

[Grifftavian]

Adventurer Save

So how did you fare? Pretty good for my first game at Immortal Level. Managed to build 9 cities, and captured two Barbarian Cities. Never fought any wars, stayed on good terms with Churchill and Frederick, actually had a defensive pack with Frederick at the end, which helped. Germany had about 26 cities in my game

Did you survive to to see the end? Surprisingly, yes

Did you even win? No, lost to a Cultural Victory by Frederick in 1919 AD. Carthage and London had also achieved Legendary Culture in my game. Didn't have a shot at any of the victory conditions; Frederick built the UN, almost everyone but me had built The Apollo Program, and Joao II had his spaceship half built when the game ended. I was way behind in technology, had just finished Chemistry and upgraded my Caravels and Triremes to Frigates, but everyone else had Destroyers at least. I could build Riflemen, but everyone else had Infantry. Was bee-lining Artillery when the game ended. I think the defensive pact with Frederick kept me from being a juicy target

Do you still want to lynch the map maker? Absolutely not! I thought it was a pretty good map, especially for people like me who don't usually try games at this level. Good starting location, able to block off access to the northern part of the continent and expand without fighting.

Looking forward to BOTM 23.

 

[civ_steve]

Just submitted - 1840 SS loss to Joao (Portugal). He was an absolute powerhouse in my game - had a great setup, isoloated but large enough landmass with all the necessary resources. Scary!

Let's see - 8 cities total - capital in starting spot, Vienne just South to grab Pigs and Horses, captured Barbarian city on Silk River, grabbed 2Gems/Fish to block Churchill, and Clams just north of there, Iron/Clams on West Coast, Sheep just to NW of capital, and Iron/Fish to North. Much later America founded in the space I'd left on the West coast between the Sheep city and the Iron/Clams city - it was later captured by Hannible, and finally taken by Frederick. I stayed at Peace the whole game!

I made it to Optics first, and got a 4 - 5 turn headstart on sending out my Caravels before I traded it (Tech trading was necessary at all times, and I couldn't hold back much). So I got the circumnavigation bonus first - one of the few things that worked out right.

When I met Joao, he was the clear leader. I decided to switch all my espionage points to him 100% (Not that I had many at the time).

Even though I was first to Education all to myself, and traded it to no one, Joao still managed to learn it and probably used Great Artists to bulb Liberalism ahead of me. Lost out by about 4 turns, and that free tech would have made a big difference.

It was tough after that, but I found I could learn a Tech, then trade it with the middle-of-the-road AI's (the Americans and the Dutch) to gradually pull up. Frederick dominated down the Physics-Electricity-Radio-MassMedia route, and ultimately built the UN. Churchill was fastest along the Artillery-Rocketry route, and built Apollo first, but he kind of stalled at that point. Joao had gotten to Industrialism first, and took the clear lead.

So I'm trailing by a bit and trying to get caught up. What to do? I've never played Espionage games before, but I decided I would have to try something, so I started building all the Jails, Intelligience Bureaus, etc, that I could to get my base EP's up. This required Slavery for most of my lower tier cities; fortunately I got most of them built before the UN forced a global change of civics to Emancipation. Even without anything being put to Espionage, I was accumulating over 300 EP's a turn.

I realized at one point that Spies can sabotage Projects. What better project to sabotage than Joao's spaceship! So, too late, I switched from Science to Espionage and started building Spies and some transports to carry them over. I was gaining about 1400 EP's a turn and was quickly reaching the >20,000 Ep's I would need to do the mission, when he launched. The option was off the table.

So I converted my Espionage back to Science to finish Fission, planning to build some Marines, put them on transports, build Manhattan and nuke Joao, hopefully capturing Lisbon before the spaceship arrived. Not sure if that negates the spaceship win, but it would make me feel better. Alas, not to be - he gets the win before I can get all my pieces in place.

So I play for "just a few more turns". It took about 5. I had 3 ICBM's, 4 transports filled with Marines off the coast, and about 5 Spies still undiscovered in Lisbon (I had about 20 at the peak, but 1 would be discovered nearly every turn). I put the city into Revolt, destroyed his Bunker and a few other buildings, then declared war, Lauched the ICBM's (he had SDI already), 2 out of 3 hit, and my marines easily captured the city. Not bad. This was done fast enough that even though Lincoln and Churchill also declared on my, no one else had any ICBM's to launch. Heh, heh, heh...

Oh well, enough of that frivolity. If I have a save close enough to the end to test out the Espionage approach, I may try it. The other AI were not that close to finishing their spaceship, and if I could knock Joao's out by Spies, I believe I could have a chance to build my own ...

 

[Capt Buttkick]

I think I did alright in this game. I knew I couldn't afford to make mistakes in a diety game; and I was made to pay for not switching to Winnie's religion early on. Later I missed out on both GLib and Lib by a couple of turns, so I decided to see if I could survive till the end.

Settled in with my 6 cities for a love feast where I tried to share as many fav civics with the AI as possible (kudos to the mapmaker for making a nice backup plan for diplo there btw ). Willy declared twice, but he didn't get anywhere b/c he tried to attack where I was strongest (gems city). In the end, Freddy with his 20+ cities got a space victory in the 1800's sometime.

At least, I survived, and had a fun game all around

 

[mabraham]

Deity save. My heart was never in this game, and when I lost four out of the first five combats to early barbs when their attack was at 20, 40, 40 and 30% respectively I lost most of the rest of my interest. In the meantime I'd lost my capital once and my sheep city once. That created an interesting effect where my palace popped the borders of city #2... but since I was going to build a monument anyway and didn't want the fat cross of that city yet, it was all pointless. Of course, I also lost two out of two attacks from barb galleys later.

So I built a pile of Gallic Warriors, but protective Churchill had the Chichen Itza as well by then, so I built a pile of catapults and by then he had longbows. So I threw my stack on the western blockade city and my run of luck stayed about the same. So I abandoned in disgust in 300AD.

 

[ianw1610]

I haven't won a Red Ambulance for a while, but in this game I'm a nailed-on certainty to win it!!

Tried to prioritise Research early on, and beelined for an Academy, at the expense of early REX. Indeed, there was a time when I had just 2 cities, but Churchill & Fred had already expanded to 15 & 16 cities respectively.

I did expand up to 6 cities, but some were sub-optimal, as Churchill had taken the choke-points. By this point, Churchill & Fred had 22 & 23 cities respectively. I had to set my Research slider to 0% to break even financially, so made no technological progress... my Science Academy multiplier was no use with base Science @ zero !!!

Eventually Churchill put me out of my misering by DoWing with his Knights, against my Archers and Gallic Warriors. Game Over.

After my abysmal first attempt at this BOTM, as detailed above, I played this again, with the Deity save again, trying to pretend that I had no prior knowledge of the map.

This time I got a win - Religious in 1460AD - Churchill and Fred voted for me due to shared Religion and Fair & Forthright Trading (which consisted of lots of lump sum gold gifts from me to them, as I couldn't keep up in the tech race!). In my original submission I'd thought about aiming for a Religious win, but decided against it!

Obviously I can't submit as it was a second attempt, but it is still good to know that a Deity xOTM is winnable!

I'll now settle back and claim my Red Ambulace from my first submission!!

 

[beestar]

Congratulations, the first announced victory in BOTM22

 

[Harbourboy]

Add me to the cavalcade of losers in this game.

My experience was not much different to a few others on here. I played the Contender Deity save, I got 6 cities, I struggled along on tactical tech trades for a while, until the AIs eventually monstered ahead and started gifting me techs instead of trading them. I then just kept pressing Enter for hours until Joao launched his inevitable spaceship.

Oh well, looking forward to see if anybody manages to win this for real.

 

[jesusin]

jesusin, contender, goal: Gold medal
Result: run out of time in a no-hope game

Bug found: I know that Joao is in the game not in F4 diplo screen, but yes in F8-members screen.

Get MC for forges, then 0% again. I get greedy and don't trade immediately. Happens twice. Then they all get Machinery while I had half of it. And I'm at 0%, saving for my army. I've been left out of the trading game. This is disastrous, I lose faith in winning the game.

500AD: 8cities, 59pop, 47mil units (GW), 7wor, MC,Constr, no CoL. +19gpt at 0%
Dow Churchill and his protective longbows 650AD with my 2 stacks.

Failed first attack in useless W city on the way to the GPFarm, got it following turn, I had killed 12 units but lost 23, if I had brought 3 more Cats everything would have been different.

In the E I take the MoM city with 5 loses, those 4 first strike lbs are terrible! In the W a single mace in the open is stopping my whole army, there's nothing I can throw at him.

I'm doing -50gpt at 0%.

Attack and fail to take the GPFarm, if only I had had 10 more GW there!

It's 900AD. I have to stop a couple of cities from building units to start building wealth, that's the price to pay when your army stalls.

Hannibal full hands are explained by the fact that he's at war with Will, ufff. They all have carvels while I haven't got a single more tech. Fred has 23 cities. The game is out of control.

1000AD Stats: 10 cities, 79 pop, 7 workers, 75 units (34GW), 1 strategic resources, 4 luxury resources, 7 health resources, 2 great persons, 0 world wonders, 1 national wonders, food/production/commerce=160-157-35, -22 sustainable beakers per turn, 48 culture per turn, 6 great person points per turn, 133 gold. 1 religions. 0/0 cottages used, 21! Techs: Constr, Curr, IW, Alpha, MC, no Aest. 0 civs killed. 14 hours played.

I take somee units out, they die and kill, getting nothing usefull out of it all. I take the GPFarm, lose the MoM city. I advance to his core but there are 30 units (muskets included) there. My whole E stack is lost.

Starve to control unhappiness, mistake, should have whipped.
1120AD: both circumn and Liberalism are taken.

I realise I should have let the pass free, so that Churchill units would have moved N leaving the juicy cities for my taking. Too late now. No time to continue. It's hopeless anyway.




Was this winnable militarily? I don't think so. One can prepare a costly amphybious assault on the 1 tile island and then on little Hannibal, but in the meanwhile Fred gets 25 cities settled... difficult position.

Did I use the UU? Yes, sent a lot of them to death.
Would I still want to lynch the map maker? Sure, why not?

 

[beestar]

What's the deal with Freddy's starting position, anyway? He starts with a huge expanse of land to his east that isn't contested by any other AI. I think he got 20+ cities in everyone's game.

 

[Harbourboy]

What happens if nobody gets a victory?

 

[Lexad]

I also failed military rush - 20-GW stack with constant refills from homeland turned out to be not enough Love Churchill's capital, btw.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

What happens if nobody gets a victory?

Then nobody gets any awards. Same as in these deity WOTM 18 results

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Bug found: I know that Joao is in the game not in F4 diplo screen, but yes in F8-members screen.

Would that happen if Joao was a colony set up by one of the other AIs?

 

[nealw]

dynamic spirit:

heres a suggestion for another rapage map

archipaeligo(tiny islands, high sea) deity

hecka impossible!

although botm22 was pretty rough