BOTM 57 Final Spoiler - game submitted or abandoned

[kcd_swede]

Well, ok, but misclicks are one of the hazards. I don't think I've ever played a game without a single misclick. For the admins, it is impossible to distinguish between a misclick and a lost gamble, in most cases. It would be an enormous workload to make exceptions for when it appears obvious to be just a misclick.

A lot of times people will take peace without accepting capitulation, for instance if they are going for gold medal and plan on taking all the cities later after resupplying their troops.

So from a "fair play" standpoint, the only managable policy is one of no replays.

I'm very happy it did not cost you the game. Next time it might, so ... be... more.. careful.

 

[Greeder]

Terrible failure. Slow REX. Around 1870 AD I declared on Hatty with tech parity and Infantries. Managed to get her poor capitol and then her SoD appeared. Peace. Open borders. And then the biggest mistake - stop trading with her at Viking request. I should go with all my army through her territory to finish off Pacal. I didn't so he won Culture.
What a stuuupid way to lose a game...

 

[zamint3]

When I met Shaka and Ragnar, around 700AD via culture bridge through the island south, they had no religion at all, so I started spreading confu.

Much later I met Hatze and my missionaries started spreading confu to that continent. At the end there were 55 cities with confucianism, never spread to Mehmed though.

I used a lot of spies to try and keep the AI in the right civic and the right religion at the same time, at the end I had 600 EP-points per turn without touching the slider.

Final vote: Shaka, Ragnar, Pacal, Stalin and Ice for Ice, Mehmed abstained and Hatze for Hatze.

My army at the end consisted of 35 warriors, 3 chariots and 1 airship.

 

[kcd_swede]

When I met Shaka and Ragnar, around 700AD via culture bridge through the island south, they had no religion at all, so I started spreading confu.

Much later I met Hatze and my missionaries started spreading confu to that continent. At the end there were 55 cities with confucianism, never spread to Mehmed though.

I used a lot of spies to try and keep the AI in the right civic and the right religion at the same time, at the end I had 600 EP-points per turn without touching the slider.

Final vote: Shaka, Ragnar, Pacal, Stalin and Ice for Ice, Mehmed abstained and Hatze for Hatze.

My army at the end consisted of 35 warriors, 3 chariots and 1 airship.

Good job!

 

[Xcalibrator]

My army at the end consisted of 35 warriors, 3 chariots and 1 airship.

That was highly efficient! I also got a Diplo win, 1949, with somewhat more units. Actually, I got Domination the same turn, but the RNG came up Diplo. This was a real nail-biter for me, contending with Cultural attempts by Hattie and Pacal. They each got within 10 turns, as I frantically sent spies to their 3rd-to-be-Legendary cities to cause revolts.

At 1AD I had 6 cities and 25 pop. Got the Great Lib 250 AD, then Music/Great Artist 375, Parthenon in 475, and bulbed Philo for Taoism 620. I ran Pacifism to spam Scientists and did a triple bulb for Optics + Astro in 1200 and met Shaka shortly after. Hmm... why do I not have any foreign trade routes after all my efforts to get Astro?! Ah, Shaka has no coastal city that I can reach! Fortunately there was a sliver of land he hadn't settled so I shipped over a settler and grabbed it. He and Ragnar were at war, though, so I didn't have as many trade connections as I'd hoped--the route to Hattie fixed that soon after, though. My plan was to ship units to Ragnar's side of the border, attack and vassalize Shaka, and then turn on Ragnar. But before I could do that, Ragnar beat up Shaka and vassalized him! I hadn't planned on fighting both of them at once, but whatcha gonna do? I was first to Steel (and had a monopoly for quite awhile) so once I got enough cannon I finally attacked in 1700. By 1864 Shaka was dead after a rather tense war and I could turn all my attention to Ragnar, who now had cannon, too. I also noticed at that time that Pacal was going for Culture and was 51 turns away.

In 1919 I finally vassalized Ragnar after beating him down to 1 city (so that I could get access to his east coast and thus to Pacal), getting MilSci, Democ, and Divine Right. I was still behind the other AIs by several techs but still had a monopoly (apart from Rags) on Artillery. Meanwhile, my spies had been causing mischief in Pacal's 3rd cultural city and he eventually gave up and switched to Space. Phew! But now Hattie was even closer to a Culture win (about 15 turns to go) so I turned to her and noticed she had 53 destroyers and 5 battleships in Thebes! (OK, not as good as the 100 ships you saw, WelshG, but I was pretty amused--I stopped smiling once my airships revealed some of her subs.) I shipped over lots of my Zulu/Viking veterans and DoW'd her around 1932, taking Thebes (one of her Legendary cities) in 1940. I'd also shipped over some units from Norseland by ship to Maya and taken one of her southeastern cities. That was enough to get her to capitulate! Oh, Stalin had DoW'd me during the Ragnar war and taken my beach head city on Egypt's western coast, but once I took that back (to get at Hattie) he capitulated to me.

After Hattie was neutralized, Pacal was again the main threat, about 10 turns away from a Culture win. With all my veteran units now streaming toward him from 2 directions he fell pretty quickly and I vassalized him in 1947. I was right on the edge of the Dom land requirement and not entirely sure I'd be able to meet it, so when the UN vote screen came up next turn I chose the Victory vote, since I was sure I could win that. As it turned out, I got 64.14% land next turn when some captured cities popped their borders. I'd pretty well caught up in tech with everybody but Mehmed by the end--he was working on Space but quite far off from launch.

This was a real fun one! I did make some real dumb mistakes, though. Should have sent the warrior to the west (instead of SW onto the hill) so I could see more of the SIP position--wasted 2 turns wandering before coming back to the original location. I also had a brain fart and did a 2-turn revolt BEFORE starting my first Golden Age with the Music Artist that I'd specifically been saving for the occasion. And then I sold my map to Pacal 2 turns before I would have gotten circumnav. I also didn't get Moai and Oxford until.... well, really late.

 

[Conquistador 63]

The early game

Settled in place thanks to warrior discovering sheep.

Had a good start with 5 warriors fogbusting a rather large area so I thought I could delay hooking horses with city #3. Settled #2 next to lake, sheep and 2*gold for the research. Never thought about the GW.

RNG gods didn't like my insolence and punished me:

Turn 48/500 (2080 BC) [02-Sep-2012 15:45:19]
After End Turn:
Other Player Actions:
While defending in the wild, Warrior loses to Barbarian Lion (0.26/2) (Prob Victory: 99.5%)

In other words: lost my woodsman 2 warrior defending on a forested hill to a lion!!!

From then on, my fogbusting structure collapsed, waves of barbs started to rain down on my lands and I even managed to lose my 3rd city just before connecting horses.

Turn 84/500 (775 BC) [02-Sep-2012 18:01:38]

After End Turn:
Whip anger has decreased in Utrecht
The Hague's borders expand

Other Player Actions:
While defending in Dutch territory at The Hague, Warrior 3 (Amsterdam) loses to Barbarian Archer (1.74/3) (Prob Victory: 46.1%)
The Hague lost

I had to research archery and slowly rebuild the fogbusting network - I think this slowed my game a lot.

Meeting the neighbors
Failed to beeline optics but met Shaka in 1080AD with galleys/culture bridges. Spread Confu to him and Ragnar. Like Xcal, managed to settle a city in their lands for trade routes. It was shortlived, though. As soon as Shaka vassalized Ragnar in the 1300's, he declared on me and my city was autorazed - I planned to keep it size 1 so Shaka would never have a port city.

Hattie, Stalin and Pacal were met with caravels in the 1400's. A missionary stationed near a suspicious green border eventually was met by Mehmed in the 1500's. Stalin and Mehmed declared on Hattie at different ocasions, but surprisingly enough she was able to hold her own.

The endgame
Uneventful. Decided the laziest path to victory was peaceful spacerace. Lost Lib to Pacal even before meeting him, but cottage spam and judicious tech trading catapulted me to a comfortable tech advantage over the dumb AI and its icelocked ships. Victory as late as 1917AD.

Hmm, it doesn't look that late judging from the reports here. Also, while playing I completely forgot to check about the AI's cultural progress. After submitting I loaded the victory save and only then noticed Pacal's 3rd city was still 33 turns away from legendary.

Thanks for the fun and unusual game setup, KCD!

 

[Mylene]

Messy game, soo much bad luck with combat odds against Shaky -.-
And almost did not make land area, cos i got lazy and vassaled peoples
1680 dom. dun think that will be the fastest, which was my goal
Nice map, never trust a map maker indeed

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

 

[jesusin]

Wow, Mylene, why leave the second gold unused all game long?

 

[Mylene]

Desert gold not that great, had no city planned that would have used it much

 

[shakabrade]

@Mylene

I took challenger and capped Viking, Zulu and Egypt by 1500s and thought that it wasn't good enough so I ditched it to save myself from humiliation Jovan, Evil Spock and others will expose me to with their 500AD wins.

If you win anything here, I'll officially be angry. At myself.

And you probably took challenger too.

BTW, I doubt I could have achieved what you have in 30 more turns. I can see you have high deficit while my economy is always stable in my games, and for military victories that is a mistake. I must learn to live on deficit. I don't have heart as cruel to whip so hard.

 

[Manco Capac]

Oh time, where art thou? I can't believe I played a single game over 2 weeks.
Not a matter of actual play time, but allowed time reduced in RL.

Whatever. I played in a nonsense manner, without precise goal or strategy (and even micro) until I eked out a conquest victory in 1919 AD.
The only plan I had wuz everyone has to be my slave.

The actual fun was razing cities at the despair of Mehmed.

Oh, my attack time was supaa lame; ~1550 AD Hatshe.

 

[Mylene]

Shaka nopes i did not take challenger lol oO
I think you are underestimating the evilness of this map, Tachy too, domination before 1500 here would be just super. I didn't play that great, but also not so bad i think...you should have played on ~~

 

[vranasm]

Shaka nopes i did not take challenger lol oO
I think you are underestimating the evilness of this map, Tachy too, domination before 1500 here would be just super. I didn't play that great, but also not so bad i think...you should have played on ~~

any chance we convince you on current G-Major? there is some debate about which unit will be superior for fastest finish...

I am on the side of mounted ;-).

 

[sossos]

@Mylene

I took challenger and capped Viking, Zulu and Egypt by 1500s and thought that it wasn't good enough so I ditched it to save myself from humiliation Jovan, Evil Spock and others will expose me to with their 500AD wins.

If you win anything here, I'll officially be angry. At myself.

And you probably took challenger too.

BTW, I doubt I could have achieved what you have in 30 more turns. I can see you have high deficit while my economy is always stable in my games, and for military victories that is a mistake. I must learn to live on deficit. I don't have heart as cruel to whip so hard.

@Shaka

Are you kidding? 500 AD win is impossible on this map.(AP victory with religion flipping into the green heaven?) 1500s is possible but no mistake is allowed.

If you capitulate 3 AIs in different continents, it will only take you another 20 turns(100 years) to finish the game. Why not resume?

I lost 1 city and 4 knights to Shaka(the Shaka in the game) and I forgot switching back to slavery at the last turn of the golden age. Yet I still play on. No award, but so what? The fun is in the optimization.

 

[Mylene]

any chance we convince you on current G-Major? there is some debate about which unit will be superior for fastest finish...

I am on the side of mounted ;-).

That's HoF? Uh i am not into generating till i get super maps

On this game, i agree with Sossos.
I made some mistakes, mainly underestimating Shaka's stacks and when i landed i lost way too many Curis. I also had very bad luck there, 8 fights in a row lost with better than 50% odds (not making this up ~~). And 1 AP vote had me on 10 turns peace with Pacal, before i could attack (he was in war with Stalin, no defy option on stop the war and so i got peace with him too).
So yip, i think 1500 is possible. Before that...hmms maybe Duckweed could, but really it's super hard to squeeze out that much more time in isolation.
Before ~1400AD should be impossible for Domi.

 

[shakabrade]

Shaka nopes i did not take challenger lol oO
I think you are underestimating the evilness of this map, Tachy too, domination before 1500 here would be just super. I didn't play that great, but also not so bad i think...you should have played on ~~

Well, what's done is done. I wanted conquest before domination, but whichever came first would satisfy me. I am not usually so goal oriented. Went for cavalry instead of cuirs since I thought that'd be faster. But I did make a mistake I couldn't live with. I built Oxford and delayed my attack date. It was stupid since I thought this game needed industrial units.

On the war front, my Cavalries had hard time against Shaka's infinite stacks of Longbows, Knights and Maces. I really didn't have luck or average luck with him and capping him took forever due to his war succes because of many wins he got on low odds so I was already in ragequit mode. Especially since Ragnar's stack composition wasn't much different and it was like cutting the butter. That made me feel I already lost too much time. I thought 50 cavalries were sufficient and didn't bother with sending reinforcements but stacked all newely built cavalries and transported them to Egypt land. They did fine job. Had some difficulties with last cities since Hatshe got to Rifling but numbers did the job.

I had to wait for my veterans from Viking/Zulu continent who stayed there 20 turns more than planned. Then I decided to gamble. I sent 30 cavalries I had left from Hatty war against Stalin without waiting for veterans since Pacal had Rifles and many of them due to war with Stallin he had not so long ago. Unfortunately Stalin went Shaka on me and killed all my cavalries on the continent with pikes and war elephants (I saw that coming but I was into all-in mode and just couldn't stop attacking until I killed all my army). If I had all my army in one stack and a bit earlier attack date (without OU) it'd be piece of cake but some of my mistakes+RNG killed my game. All my interest was gone. Winning the game wasn't in question so there was no challenge in that, while my victory date was greatly compromised so there was no glory. No challenge + no glory + too much work in RL = no motivation to resume

@Shaka

Are you kidding? 500 AD win is impossible on this map.(AP victory with religion flipping into the green heaven?) 1500s is possible but no mistake is allowed.

If you capitulate 3 AIs in different continents, it will only take you another 20 turns(100 years) to finish the game. Why not resume?

I lost 1 city and 4 knights to Shaka(the Shaka in the game) and I forgot switching back to slavery at the last turn of the golden age. Yet I still play on. No award, but so what? The fun is in the optimization.

500AD was exaggerating, but who knows. Those guys always pull dates uncomprehendable to me.
Based on my game, I think 1100 AD conquest could be possible. Mix of treb war against Viking/Zulu and mounted war against other continent could do the trick if very very lucky, which is important part of competitive games. Also, I played without chops and, apparently, did well, so with them it'd be much better.

Maybe I'd played on after reading all this but my computer is a mess due tu malicious software I picked up visiting akhm sites and I don't have civilization or any game on my PC anymore. Didn't play civ for almost two weeks.

Evaluating victory date is also a skill and since you guys and gals with skills think I should have played on it only means I am bad at evaluating and should work on that. Hopefully, SGOTM starts in 9 days.

 

[Manco Capac]

Shaka nopes i did not take challenger lol oO
I think you are underestimating the evilness of this map, Tachy too, domination before 1500 here would be just super. I didn't play that great, but also not so bad i think...you should have played on ~~

In what sense I underestimated. In term of winning dates? Or just winning.
Winning wasn't a matter to me and I knew from the very beginning early date wasn't fitted to this one.

I really didn't have luck or average luck with him and capping him took forever due to his war succes because of many wins he got on low odds so I was already in ragequit mode.

...

Winning the game wasn't in question so there was no challenge in that, while my victory date was greatly compromised so there was no glory. No challenge + no glory + too much work in RL = no motivation to resume

Now, you disappoint me. Not only you are at least 50% stronger than I, but looking combination of predictions (1100 AD) and actual achievements makes me wonder where is your calm attitude about resuming a game.

My game was trice as disappointing and I had lost a great deal of cuirassiers on Hatshe and some of first early waves were about huge losses without gains.

Still, although the RL compression and my high tendency of rage-quitting, I resumed the game just for the win. And learning.

And I'm proud I contained my rage for once.

Based on my game, I think 1100 AD conquest could be possible.

How so? Mehmed isn't that reachable.
And I'm unsure of Jovan, evil_spock and the rest's abilities on IMM+.
We have to know how IMM+ are different beasts than the lower levels.

 

[Mylene]

Hmm maybe i misunderstood, you both seem to beat yourselves here cos you feel you played slow?

Let's not forget the many obstacles...Amsterdam low food, gold was nice and production too, but low food = still troubles.
Many potential barb pops, as usual in Iso...and chariots can lose, with some bad luck progress will be delayed.

Both ways towards AIs were connected with average cities. i settled east rather late.
For Mehmed, i still was not sure after i won how i would have reached him..
So after getting Astro, i found out that i had to settle 2 cities on Shaka's and Hatshy's land for trades. Cos both did not settle on the coast.

With some more planning, could have seen that earlier..no doubts, but i find it's rather tuff keeping my focus high in Iso.
So i think everybody who did domination or conquest played a good game, late or not...meh ~~

 

[shakabrade]

In what sense I underestimated. In term of winning dates? Or just winning.
Winning wasn't a matter to me and I knew from the very beginning early date wasn't fitted to this one.





Now, you disappoint me. Not only you are at least 50% stronger than I, but looking combination of predictions (1100 AD) and actual achievements makes me wonder where is your calm attitude about resuming a game.

My game was trice as disappointing and I had lost a great deal of cuirassiers on Hatshe and some of first early waves were about huge losses without gains.

Still, although the RL compression and my high tendency of rage-quitting, I resumed the game just for the win. And learning.

And I'm proud I contained my rage for once.



How so? Mehmed isn't that reachable.
And I'm unsure of Jovan, evil_spock and the rest's abilities on IMM+.
We have to know how IMM+ are different beasts than the lower levels.

I was just furious since that day I played was the only day for civ I had available. I played it in one session. My RL pressure last couple of weeks is probably at its lifetime peak so I just didn't have time to waste on game I failed my objective and that was fastest date and/or medal. I realized I'd lose much more neglecting my RL obligations than by not continuing ruined game.

I don't think I am 50% stronger than you. Maybe on deity, maybe, but on other levels no. Actually, BiC described my skill the best. I am resilient, meaning I can win from most desperate positions, but my dates aren't impressive, even if maps are good.

Regarding date.1500AD is possible with my game, then 1300 AD if one played more optimal game and attacked with cuirs without building OU.

1250AD is possible if stalin, hatty, pacal and mehmed all had different religions and hated and battled each other so that their tech pace was slower.

And 1100AD is Duckweed factor. That one I can't explain but I think I don't have to.


Sorry I disappointed you but trust me my decision to turn my attention to RL was only good decision I made.

Besides, couple of days after that my civ started crashing on start. I don't have civ working right now but I do have MATLAB and power plant thermodynamic efficiency to optimize by yesterday.

 

[kcd_swede]

Nice discussion! We are all learning from it. Personally, I thought maybe five or six victories at best... but the reports here indicate that word got out and the gauntlet was dropped. I'm glad. And you guys are surely glad that I am forbidden to make deity maps.