BOTM 29 Final Spoiler

[neilmeister]

Space Loss to lizzie,

I almost won a diplo victory 3 times, but each time was about 50 votes short.
Kind of amazing actually, as Liz stomped me at around 1100BC. She took all of my cities she could reach, leaving me with only Machu Pichu on the copper island. Managed to recover well enough to keep up with the techs, very patiently built a GE after a forge, so the UN could be built pronto.

At every vote, all but 2 of the AI voted for me, problem was than Liz was massive, and this was enough to stop my victory.
Got screwed by Hammurabi & Asoka, they both formed colonies before different votes and the colonies took a while to like me enough. If either had not formed a colony, I would be doing my happy dance right now.

 

[Lexad]

Went for a quickie. Quechuas are my heart's darlings.

 

[lroumen]

Tried to use quechas against Ghandi but he miraculously had chariots. Subsequently I was outteched and outexpanded by the AI.
I tried to do a religious victory under hinduism, but all the other AIs were under judaism and the founder of the hinduism, ghandi, went into free religion and never spread it to the other AIs very well.
No options so I quit the game, no submission. The game became way too boring because if you cannot make a good early start you loose anyway. I don't like high level starts where the AI gets all these stupid bonuses. Hoping for a new noble->monarch type game.

 

[kcd_swede]

Although this is unlikely to be the fastest AP victory (unless the “hit’em where they ain’t” factor plays in), it ought to be the highest scoring one. It is certainly my highest scoring AP victory ever, so not so bad.

How quickly I forget... Now that the results were posted, I recall that I actually beat this score in the BOTM28, just last month! That one yielded a lowest scoring religious victory award.

Its looking more and more like this one will too.

 

[neilmeister]

No options so I quit the game, no submission. The game became way too boring because if you cannot make a good early start you loose anyway.

I have to disagree. I was left at 1100BC with 1 city on an island, and I still almost won. I'm glad I hung in there.

Lizzie invaded my island empire 3 times, and each time I just managed to recover the cities she took.

 

[Killer_Klein]

I lost the Space Race to India as an Adventurer.

This was my first GOTM with Civ4. I have just starting recently playing Civ4 and I haven't played at this high a difficulty yet. The Civ3 helped me improve my game, so I figured it would here as well.

I made a number of mistakes that ended up being costly.

Since, I have never played Inca decided to avoid a Q-Rush and decided to go with Sailing and expanded north into the islands. My first settler was 2 spaces north of the horses on the lake. Used it to block expansion that way. My first big mistake was not settling near the sugar just to the S. India took it and it ended up being the 3rd or 4th best city even without any wonders.

I avoid going to the war the whole game which was good because I was always behind in tech except near the end. England and India were the two big dogs all game and I didn't want to get caught up in a war to have them dragged into it.

One of the things I did well was prepare for Astro. which is something I am normally pretty bad at. I wasn't the first one to settle the New World but I ended up taking most of the southern continent. I finished with the most land area and 3rd in pop.

My biggest mistake was mid-game when I didn't go after Democracy right away. I focused on a couple of other tech and I severely underestimated the effect of Emanicaption would have on my nation. It cut production by a lot and caused a number of cities to shrink during that time. By the time I went after Democracy, I had to get Nationalism and Constution and nobody would trade.

My Great Leaders were a bit of a bust as well. Didn't get one for a long time and my first one was a Engineer. I was saving him for a wonder but my bad call on Democracy but me so far behind in the tech race that I really ended up wasting him (I sat on him for at least 150 turns or more). I used him and a great spy for a second golden age that help me catch up in tech. I produced 3-4 great merchants to help buy and research techs. I also had a great artist for my first golden age.

Overall, got the loss but I learn quite a bit for next time. Maybe, I will pull off a victory next month.

 

[babybluepants]

220 AD religious win, 66k.

No time this month, so I ended up with a single-session easy cheesy AP win. It's a bit a ridiculous that this is considered a win, since most of my recent losses were played about 10x better. Seems like it could have been a really fun game...

The gold location was just evil.

@Duckweed, that's really a shame, and that is one seeexy capital.

 

[kcd_swede]

220 AD religious win, 66k.

No time this month, so I ended up with a single-session easy cheesy AP win. It's a bit a ridiculous that this is considered a win, since most of my recent losses were played about 10x better. Seems like it could have been a really fun game...

The gold location was just evil.

@Duckweed, that's really a shame, and that is one seeexy capital.

Oooohh, you took my fastest relisious victory award! (That's ok, I have two more just like it at home).

As I was 25 turns from my targetted UN victory anyhow, I didn't feel like it was so cheesy. But if you aimed for cheese, this was the map to do it. Good job!

 

[Duckweed]

220 AD religious win, 66k.

No time this month, so I ended up with a single-session easy cheesy AP win. It's a bit a ridiculous that this is considered a win, since most of my recent losses were played about 10x better. Seems like it could have been a really fun game...

The gold location was just evil.

@Duckweed, that's really a shame, and that is one seeexy capital.

220AD is pretty decent for fastest religious award.

Thanks, I put extreme patience to foster it. Terra = Terrible for my current computer.

 

[babybluepants]

220AD is pretty decent for fastest religious award.

Thx, but not really. I guess I should post a report of some kind. I was too lazy to before...

I decided on it very early, harbouring some vague hope of a Theo sling. When the Oracle went in 2000's, I just played it out without putting much thought into it. Mainly, I underestimated what it would take to self-tech Theo, since I have no experience with this. I skipped some basic economic techs for a more-or-less straight beeline, and that really hurt. Ended up only getting to it circa 500 BC.

Since the whole world except for Liz was Hindu and I had Theo to jump start tech trading for bonuses, I think getting a couple of AI votes was possible as early as 500 BC. I played with a vague notion that I'd need 6-8 cities with enough population to win, but that proved to be false. Really only would have needed 3-4.

Also, poor scouting resulted in not knowing where Will and Liz were until the very end, so I think the missionary paths were suboptimal, though that only causes a relatively short delay.

I think it's easily doable in the BC's, but I'm not sure how fast exactly.

 

[kcd_swede]

I decided on it very early, harbouring some vague hope of a Theo sling. When the Oracle went in 2000's, I just played it out without putting much thought into it. Mainly, I underestimated what it would take to self-tech Theo, since I have no experience with this. I skipped some basic economic techs for a more-or-less straight beeline, and that really hurt. Ended up only getting to it circa 500 BC.

Hmmm... my back-up plan is usually to bulb it with a GPro, which are fairly easy to get almost as fast as the Oracle (when playing multiple city cheese).

 

[babybluepants]

Well, like I said, I have no experience with this. What do you use to generate the GP that fast? Just grind it out with an early temple (assuming you have religion spread in time)?

 

[Lexad]

Oracle, henge, temple; mixed attempt with Artemis. It's easy for Egyptians.

 

[babybluepants]

Ok. I was assuming that if it's a back-up for a failed Oracle sling, the SH would be long built already. Which leaves only temple (unless you're Egyptian). Even without a library-Sci/ToA mixed attempt, just one temple is a bit faster than my game was (in this case, I'd guess circa 800-700 BC). With the added advantage of cash for more aggressive expansion, I suppose. Learned something...

 

[ianw1610]

220 AD religious win, 66k.

Good finish date... but I was able to edge a BC Religious Victory.

Huayna is probably most well known for his Quechua... but he is also IMHO more suited than any other leader to obtaining a Religious victory. Combined with a game where all leaders start on one landmass, my only intention was to aim at a Religious win.

(Almost) everything went to plan. Oracled Theology. Built the AP as Christian. Got Judaism from an Indian missionary - the whole world was Jewish except for Buddhist Liz. Everyone loved me.

The only thing that slowed me down was a missionary failure to Sitting Bull, near the end, so I had to send a 2nd missionary his way and lost ~70 years on my victory date. Date of victory was still however 80BC.

I never got round to building a 2nd city at all, so the sum total of lands in my victorious empire at the end was Cuzco (population 5) and nothing more! Lowest scoring Religious victory for sure... possibly in with a shot at fastest Religious victory as well...

Time spent on this game was just 61 minutes - nice and efficient!!!!!!

 

[Lexad]

That's what I call a good game!

 

[Htadus]

Date of victory was still however 80BC.

I never got round to building a 2nd city at all, so the sum total of lands in my victorious empire at the end was Cuzco (population 5) and nothing more! Lowest scoring Religious victory for sure... possibly in with a shot at fastest Religious victory as well...

Time spent on this game was just 61 minutes - nice and efficient!!!!!!

That is what I call a focussed game.

On the contrary, my game lost its momentum due to lack of focus. I missed both my opposing goals of getting over 200K and winning by culture before 1600AD. Oh well. There will be another chance.

 

[babybluepants]

Excellent work, ian! Glad someone did it properly. I obviously have lots to learn about this kind of game.

 

[ianw1610]

Thanks

Also of note, I beelined Sailing as early as I could, as I REALLY wanted that Gold mine!!

The 1-city empire part was not part of my plan, but at the time when I should have been building a Settler for a 2nd city, I was busy pumping out Quechua after Quechua after Quechua, to deal with the MASSES of Barbarians that seemed to invade my game!!!

 

[Deckhand]

1730 Cultural Victory.

Liz was huge and blocked me off from the east.
No Colonies were formed. Only Willem and Hatsheput fought.

Took Nationalism from Liberalism and managed to build Taj.
1 Great Scientist = Education Bulb; 3 Great Engineers: Sistine Chapel, Golden Age and Golden Age with Merchant; next 8 Great People were Artists (used 7 to get Machu Picchu to Legendary same turn as Cuzco, 2 turns after Tiwanaku).

Built 3 more cities (beyond 6 in first spoiler) but they didn't contribute much - just one cathedral for Machu, took a city from English by Palace Decree (gave me a temporary -2 diplomacy hit for voting against her) and another one by culture flip, so ended up with eleven.

Could have won sooner if I had remembered to switch to Free Speech in my first golden age.