CE vs SE Head-to-Head Experiment Part II

[futurehermit]

DaveMcW and I have agreed to another CE vs SE head-to-head show down.

This thread will probably get long and the other one was already long, so I figured a new thread was probably a good idea

The rules:

-Both of us will play as Peter on Monarch/Continents/Normal/Patched Warlords

-He will play CE and can only run specialists in a dedicated GPfarm (exception is when running mercantilism or wonders that give free specialists)

-I will play SE and can only build cottages in capital for CS. I have also agreed to farm over mature captured cottages.

-There are three goals:

1) First to liberalism, fastest there gets a cookie

2) Must eliminate a rival civ prior to reaching liberalism

3) Must win by space race, fastest there gets two cookies

-We agreed that stone must be in capital or 2nd city location so I can build the pyramids to have full-fledged SE (he said making space race the victory condition gave him an edge for the CE so he doesn't need financial )

We are both going to start from the same save to make it fair (it is attached).

I have posted a starting screenshot as well.

Should be fun

 

[NaZdReG]

crazy good starting position for either opening. good luck to you both!

NaZ

 

[acidsatyr]

that start is out of this world.

SE with pyramids and philo.... its just a question by how many centuries youll win liberalism race

 

[frob2900]

For the pre-AD years, wont most research be coming out of the first two cities, i.e. probably the capital and the GP farm, hence wont you pretty much be running the same economy for this period of time?

 

[futurehermit]

Yeah, it's a great start, and I didn't even mess around with it in worldbuilder or anything like that

It's only the second map I rolled as well. First one didn't have stone.

EDIT: I will play the whole game through before posting anything so that me and McW don't influence each other.

 

[Mutineer]

I think you chouse to low dificulty level.
The higher dificulty level = the stronger SE is.

 

[futurehermit]

Fair enough, but I'm not a consistent emperor player (I'm just getting back into it after months off). Want to try your hand at a game?

 

[DaveMcW]

Got it.

 

[Mr. Civtastic]

Godspeed. Looking forward to seeing the results. And I like Peter too. I'll be interested to see with economy gets a benefit from expansive's quicker workers. I also like how you guys are doing one gp farm or one cottage city. Thats the way I do it

 

[futurehermit]

Started playing last night.

I've made a few minor mistakes (my biggest weakness is sloppy play at times), but overall I think things are progressing nicely. I've learned a lot already that I'm going to try and transfer to Gandhi after this game (I'm experimenting with early caste system, which I normally don't do).

I have to say that my elimination of a rival civ is going to be delayed a bunch of turns since they built a city a bazillion miles from their capital and I can't convince one of the AI's to turn it into one of their cities

Liberalism should indeed come in at a respectable time, however.

I'm really looking forward to seeing what I can come up with in the industrial and modern eras since I rarely play them

ps, should mention I got masonry from a goody hut

 

[DaveMcW]

I completed objective #2 at

Spoiler date :

175 AD. Rest in peace Wang Kon.

Now I'm building workers to cottage spam the conquered lands. Science it at 50% and I'm still far from Liberalism. I will try to get as close to Democracy as I can with my free tech.

 

[lilnev]

A philosophical leader with stone in the fat cross, running a CE? Sign me up! I couldn't resist. I'm up to about 1100 AD, feeling good. Details in the spoiler, in case y'all don't want to read 'em yet.

Spoiler :

REXed early, expanding east to block Ramses. Ended up settling eight(!) admittedly somewhat cramped cities before going to war. The capital just has too much food, so I kept putting down more cities with overlap to poach some of it away. Initial tech sequence: BW (it is a worker tech), Ag, Wheel, Pottery, AH. Went to war with Ramses post-cats, killed him in 400 AD. Captured 2 cities, relocated a third, razed the last two. No early wonders until the Great Library in my capital, though I've since set up Thebes as my GP farm. Capital has HE. Lots of workers (13 I think?), lots of cottages. Not as much whipping as I'm used to, though I did use it some for the war effort. War with Wang Kon in 800 AD, accepting techs when he's down to one small city in ~1040 AD. Liberalism in 900 AD choosing Nationalism, though I could have had it a lot sooner. There was no pressure, so I detoured for MC, Machinery, PP (largely lightbulbed) and Compass (was considering Optics to meet the neighbors, but then I got nervous and finished Liberalism instead. Turns out there was still no rush). I've now got Econ, and Democracy is about 3 turns away, so things should take off soon.

Good fun.

peace,
lilnev

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

I'm still putting my money on the CE economy to win the space race. If it were cultural then it might get interesting.

 

[DaveMcW]

The game moves fast when you're at peace.

I got liberalism and democracy in the same year,

Spoiler date :

1030 AD.

I'm up to 60% science, hopefully fast-growing cottages and courthouses can boost that even more.

 

[acidsatyr]

1030ad for liberalism is very late.
With proper use of GS futurehermit should be able to get to it under 800AD

 

[futurehermit]

He did land democracy with it though. I will probably aim to get liberalism asap, meaning I will get it faster, but not as good of a free tech (I will get something on the way to democracy).

Anyways, the speed with which you get liberalism isn't the most important part of the challenge, since as long as you get it first that's all that matters. The other aspect of liberalism is getting something good for it so yeah not a huge issue, just something I wanted to see.

I will try and play further today and post some stuff re: conditions 1 and 2.

 

[acidsatyr]

ok i tought in this case it was the point to get fastest to liberalism, not what you get with it.

 

[futurehermit]

^^^Well, the point was fastest to liberalism, but since he didn't do that, I decided to go for democracy + liberalism as well

Posting update...Played to the creation of Statue of Liberty

Spoiler :

Ok, so here's my first update. I've played a bit past liberalism + democracy (free tech) to get SoL, which I used a stored GE on. I've never done that before and thought I'd get it totally for free, so I was a bit disappointed that I still had to spend a bunch of turns on it If I had known that, I would've saved a second GE Just one example of a number of small issues that made this a less-than-perfect representation of the SE. However, I make no excuses and still think it's a gg so far!

Pertinent information:

I started the game with great wall + pyramids (built both outright). This gave me some GEs which I used on GL, lightbulbing Machinery, and saved one for SoL later. I ran representation + caste system for most of the game. I avoided pacificism because of the expense plus I wanted to spread missionaries for monasteries to further increase research. Too bad no spiritual or I would've gone in and out of slavery and pacifism Oh well. I set research to 0% once I hit alphabet, switched to police state and cranked axes until I was breaking even at 0% research and then attacked Egypt. Those axes were pretty much sufficient to eliminate his empire After the axes were pumped out, I switched to representation and started cranking sci infrastructure, and I haven't stopped all game

I got liberalism + democracry in 980AD (screen attached). I would've been much faster if 1) I had better trading partners...Korea and the US just wouldn't trade much with me, even when Rameses was still alive, and even when I was pleased with them. So, that kinda sucked. Plus, I wasted turns researching drama for philosophy lightbulb because USA had CoL and I was hoping to trade it from him, but of course he never would trade it

I wiped out Rameses 225 AD. Would've been MUCH MUCH sooner, but he built this one city WAY to the south of his empire, deep in the heart of Korea, and I couldn't bribe Korea to wipe him out because he loved Egypt So, I had to spend a pile of turns marching my army down to wipe out that last city. Oh well.

I got the SoL in 1120 AD (screen attached). Pretty nice time imo. Now, with mercantilism, I get 2 free specialists per city I am now finishing up Oxford and it should come in very soon. Actually...CRAP!...as I'm sitting here writing this I just realized that I'm not building Oxford in my super sci city (capital)... These are the kinds of little mistakes I'm prone to making Oh well, only a few lost turns of production. Next time I play, I'll switch it over to the capital. Like I said, I'm not making excuses, but a more skilled player could probably shave time off some of the things I'm trying to do But I digress...

I met Monty and Brennus from the other continent. Monty is horribly backwards (screen attached). Brennus is no threat, although he was annoyed with me for trading with Korea. I gave him paper for free (Monty too) in order to get a map of their continent (which I will get next time I play) in the hopes I will win circumnavigation (not a big deal, but why not?). Brennus is now cautious with me and I'm hoping to get relations to the point on that continent that I can start wars if necessary to keep them backwards.

My immediate goals are to get everything I can from Korea and the USA and once I zoom ahead in tech, I will initiate war between them (they dislike each other and I could already bribe them, although they both still have tech I want from them, so I am holding off until I have stripped them of everything I need).

I could leave them alone and try and live in peace with USA and Korea, but I am very low on power and don't want them attacking me (USA probably wouldn't because we are now friendly, but who knows?). Plus, they are both threats to launch if I don't keep them busy.

I'm also going to (re-)build Oxford, which will really help my research asap. And with 2 free scientists/city, I'm going to continue to build more fringe cities around my empire (also to prevent AI from building annoying cities there!)

My long-term goals are to beeline to computers, skipping most of the industrial era and then immediately going for biology (maybe vice versa, we shall see...). Then I will go back and backfill necessary techs to build space parts.

We'll see how it goes So far so good, but damn would I trade expansive for spiritual in a heartbeat

EDIT: Posting some saves as well in case you want to check out my empire at different points in the game

 

[frob2900]

So far so good, but damn would I trade expansive for spiritual in a heartbeat

True. I think the expansive is fantastic during the first 2000 years or so, since it gives so such easy workers with 2.08 patch and allows fast granaries, but after that it's pretty weak IMHO.. The health bonus just isnt super fantastic..

However, I think Peter (Phi/Exp) is still better than Gandhi (Phi/Spi) since you'll get those nice research institutes once you've pulled of the computer beeline (If I remember correctly you should be able to bulb directly Physics->Electricity->Radio->Computers with GS). This should allow easy backfill of techs..

The expansive trait will also kind of make up for the -1 health for the research institutes

 

[futurehermit]

Yeah, Peter comes back into his own late game. It's just that there is that middle game dip that kinda sucks. And I always feel that I would rather have advantages loaded into the early-to-mid game. I just don't like expansive, even with the faster workers. I just think that it's much weaker than other traits (I usually pop rush workers anyways...)