Civ 3 GOTM #2 *Spoiler* talks

[Hurkyl]

This is my first GotM, and one of the few games I had the patience to stick with beyond the Ancient Era... both in Civ 2 and Civ 3.

I discovered the ideal Athens location and expanded conservatively. My second city on the flood plains, got lucky with my third down towards the romans. Managed to snag the iron too, but I failed to secure horses.

Amazingly, I only had one occurance of a major barbarian uprising near the middle, never had one attack Athens. Also, somehow, I managed to snag the Pyramids, the Colossus, and the Great Lighthouse in Athens, which got me off to a good start. My scout galley sucked, though, it got sunk by barbarians as I hit the coast of the large continent, but before I could make contact! Argh! At this time, I've gotten the middle of the continent, but rome has settled both the south and north ends.

Anyways, I made what turned out to be a devestating blunder; I accidentally accepted a trade with me giving away communications to the Romans. They get tech and more importantly IRON! Argh. I had planned to obliterate him by trading for horses, making a large knight force, then rolling him over. Unfortunately, he managed to come back and hold his own with their hoardes of legionary and longbowman. Of course, my impatience didn't help any when I attack with nearly all my knights and leave none to defend my stacks! The most interesting aspect was he kept pillaging my roads connecting the iron to my core.

After a couple wars, I get horses, and slightly over half the continent, but in the peace several cities defected, roughly equalizing landmass. I was one tile away from getting the coal supply. Play tech broker, blah blah, build lots of cultural stuff to contine my plan for a cultural victory. Eventually, I realize that I'm probably not going to pull off a cultural victory, but I realize I am producing a vast amount of shields, and realize that a space race victory seems the most viable option.

In a clever strategic gamble, I place a city on the edge of roman cultural borders, and it is able to establish a cultural foothold into roman territory, pushing very close to his capital, should war crop up again. In a big stroke of serendipity, it turns out to be next to the island's only supply of uranium. In a big stroke of bad luck, it defects to the romans.

Well, it comes down to a nail-biting space race. I figure out a clever strategy to use wall street; instead of setting research at, say, 60%, I set it at 30% for a few turns then 90% for a few turns, allowing me to accrue a surplus and get interest on it. Anyways, it all comes down to a key trading blunder the AI makes... I get synthetic fiber for the mere cost of the laser. I have 4 cities with 80 - 100 shield production allowing me to pump out the final 4 components at blinding speed and win with 2392 points in the year 1802 with a space shuttle launch.

I found it interesting to note that I was extremely isolationist. I had zero involvement in the politics of the rest of the world, aside from technology trading, aside from being the catalyst for a world war against the #1 civ at the end of the game (Chinese) by getting a MPP with the romans after the chinese catch me failing to plant a spy 3 times in a row.

Hurkyl

 

[donsig]

The Third Roman War: I took three cities, they retook two. I paid 150 gold and montheism for peace. I have decided to end these foolish wars and try to make amends with Ceasar (he is furious with me). The Germans have found our continent. Greece is the lowliest country according to demographics. Rome is ahead of me in tech but has no iron. I fear that if Rome and Greece continue warring we will both be done in by the other civs...

Time to try a different approach by ending despotism and switching to republic. It is around 900 AD...

 

[Mr. Socks]

Now, that was a long game. My first time on a large map, and now I see what people were talking about re: long waits between turns.
I ended up winning by space race in 1792 with a score of 2502. I'm not sure if that's worth submitting, although I think I will just because I played through it.
I got distracted by a couple of long wars that probably reduced my score significantly, and I bet that the territory I ended up with is unusual. I did have some lucky breaks too, though.
It was also only my 2nd time at Monarch level, and I had a lot of difficulty with that, especially in the early game -- I couldn't win the race to a single wonder until the modern era! I didn't want that to happen this game, so I made a decision to make the race to my first wonder my top priority. Since the Greeks start with alphabet, I decided to aim for the Great Library, which is my favourite ancient wonder anyway. My early game strategy was standard rapid expansion (rush building, settler and worker factories, nothing else built except minimal defense and a temple) with all my cities except my capital. The capital would make just one settler and then be allowed to grow as big as possible until I got literature and could start the GL. I would also make improvements (esp. mines) around the capital my workers' first priority. I'm not sure if this was the best strategy, but I DID manage to win the race to the GL (it was close, I think).
I found the Romans pretty quickly and had a warrior scope out their borders. In doing so I discovered the Iron on the West coast just as I got iron working from the Romans. I lucked out big time, because I was expanding almost in a straight line westward anyway, and had a settler moving that way. Although it's not really my standard practice, I decided to make a run for the Iron even though it would leave a big hole in my civ. I got to the iron with a Roman settler 1 square away! Of course, that settler plopped down a city in the hole I left, but I figured that would happen. I knew I had to take measures to prevent the iron city from being cut off and/or assimilated, and I managed to seal off a border to the north of the Roman jerk, and built two cities to the SE ans SW of it. I rushed culture in these cities, and when my borders expanded, it was sealed off from the rest of the Romans. Unfortunately, while I was doing that, the Romans settled on the remainder of the land north of me, and built a pesky city on an unclaimed square near my capital. I still considered myself lucky, though.
By this time, I'm swearing to myself as my Great Library collects dust and I don't see any other civs for aeons! I've had my science at 0% and have refused to trade techs with the Romans, waiting for my GL payoff. I'm thinking that building the GL might have been a fatal flaw in the game. Finally, an Indian boat sails by (around 500 AD, I think), carrying a cargo of techs! Mmmmmmm, sciencey!
Anyway, I figured that my next move would be to quickly build up a big enough army to take those 4 pesky Roman cities while they still didn't have Iron. Then I'd get a truce and build up an army to take some of the border cities as the first step to taking over the continent. I figured that would be more than enough land for me to sit back and develop my cities for the rest of the game, until I decided to win. I took the peskies successfully, but while I was doing that the Indians plopped down two more cities on unused squares! I neve learn! I wanted to get rid of the Indian cites before taking on the more threatening Romans. Fortunately, a war errupted between the Indians and the English, making my job easier. While I was razing the Indian cities on my continent, the war expanded and within a few turns, everybody else was at war against the Indians and Russians, including the Romans. My thoughts turned to snatching up a couple of Indian and Russian cities before they were gone. I targetted the Indian gem city (Karachi?). I filled some ships and sent them off towards the other continent. Ages passed. Children grew old and then died. Eventually, the soldiers on the boats (or their decendants) got there, but by then the city had been taken by someone else. I went to my secondary target, a Russian fur city on the coast. I captured it, and just a couple of turns before the English swept in and eliminated the Russians from the game! That fur city would be the only speck of green on the big continent until the end of the game.
I wanted the war with the Indians to end before I took on the Romans -- didn't want their allies (ie nearly everyone) to attack me. I guess I concentrated too much on city building and not enough on military during this time. Eventually, the war ended and I made a botched attempt to take some border cities. I believe I took one of them, but I lost one in the process, and it was about half way done the forbidden palace! I was somewhat shocked at the size of the Roman hordes that were now running into my borders. I managed to take back the city next turn and barely held on long enough to get a peace settlement. By this time, I was about even or slightly ahead the Romans in the tech race, and I decided I would need a tech advantage to beat the Romans. I kept waiting... eventually, I got refining and searched the map for oil. Feh! None in my borders. However, the Aztecs to the north had a nice city with three oils, and three silks right next to it! And the Romans didn't have any (God, our continent sucked). I was pretty sure that the Aztec's oil was my only hope to conquering my continent. I decided to quickly take the oil city, and hopefully the silk city too, make peace, and build some oil-powered weapons to take some of the Roman border cities.
The quick war with the Aztecs ended up lasting from 1400 to 1720! Taking the first city was much more difficult than I expected. By the time I took it, I knew that I would have to hurt the Aztecs some more, or they were going to take it right back. Unfortunately, the Romans declared war on me while I was doing this! But again luck was on my side as other nations started teaming up on the Aztecs too. Even better, they soon declared war on the Romans! Fortunately, the Romans agreed to a peace treaty with me quickly, with barely a shot fired. Now that everybody was at war with my two enemies, I decided to take all of the Aztec continent that I could before the others did, make peace to reset my war weariness and hopefully still be able to jump back into war with the Romans. I ended up with about 3/4 of the Aztec continent, with the Germans taking the remainder.
By this time, my people hated me. This was probably my biggest mistake -- I kept expecting to wrap up the war quickly, and stayed in democracy the whole time -- 320 years! Oh well. I had missed out on so much productivity during the war that I decided to put my plans for the Romans on hold for a while to build up my cities. By this time, the other civs were starting to build SS components anyway, and I knew I wouldn't have time to take the continent. So that's basically how the borders ended up as -- I had the north half of the continent + most of the Aztec continent and the Romans had the southern half. Pretty inefficient, corruption-wise (the forbidden palace was along the border near the west coast). Close to the end of the game, I did attack the Romans, just on principle . I took two cities, razed one other, and got two tiny ones in the peace treaty. The French, English, Germans and Japanese had been bombarding their coasts for centuries, and the first 3 had troops on the mainland and had taken a couple of cities.
All in all, kind of an interesting game that never seemed to go the way I wanted it to, but ended up with a win for me anyway.

 

[LeSphinx]

About The Romans-Greeks WARS !

So as I said before, I finaly decide to go to war with Romans.
I make some knights, swordmen and hopolites for defensive purpose.

It was around 790 AD: I put the troups divided in 2, in the south est of the continent. Another little group of units was send in the north wet part of the continent. Then, I declare war to Roman and tooks the first turn of war 3 cities (1 city of 6 points). And I had one Great Leader.... COOOOOOOOOL! I made an army composed by 3 knights.

Then, different long fight cames. We make peace and I trade evrything I can (Luxuries, Resources: iron and horses) with russian, indians , frenchs and english. This allows me to have new tech and some gold/turn.

I went to war another time with the roman: I took 2 more cities.
But one city came back to the roman. I took a city with salpeter around. I get my second great leader and decide to built the small wonder: forbiden palace in order to make more productive most of my cities.

We make peace. Meanwhile, I trade in order to have gunpowder.
I had to pay around 300 gold, +28 gold /turn, world map to the frenchs. But I sell it to aztecs and japon not so expensive! but!

I built musketeers and knights, knights....

Right now, I'm in 1090 AD and the forbiden palace will be finish next turn (Great leader just arrived in the city I want!). I will built the FP in a city near Rome in order to get the less corruption for the bigest city far away from the palace.

I'm in best position right now. I'm in 5th position instead of 8.

War with roman is going to be very hard because they have musketeers. As I do not get the cannons and cavalery, I will not make decisional battles in order to improve my power in the continent. So I going to make peace again still I have cannons and Cavalery.

I have to trade as max as I can. I can make research in each 7-9 turns.

Thinks are going best for me (they were very bad).

I need some details about army. What is the best configuration ?
Only offensive units in army or a mix offensive/defensive? Do you load Normal/ Veteran /elite unit in them ? What is best ?
Please help.

I wanted to see how the Forbiden palace improve the production of all my cities but my girlfriend gets up and told me it was 3 am and I have to sleep because I get up at 6 am. ...........

I hope the production/commerce will be good in order to research the tech I need (in order to trade with others civs) and to build a good army.

LeSphinx

 

[bst1]

Do you mean armies like Great Leaders make or just a fighting force? I don't suggest making the Great Leader armies. You end up with a non-upgradeable unit that only gets one attack per turn instead of 3. Imho, Great Leaders are much better used for rushing wonders. If you have an extra after building your Forbidden Palace, I suggest saving it for the UN.

As far as fighting forces go I always try and send out stacks of troops with a ratio of 4-5 offensive units for every defensive unit. Move them around in a group and try to keep them together. After you take a city or win a battle some of your units will be hurt. Park one of your defenders with them and let them heal up while you move the rest of the force around the immediate vicinity looking for easy prey. But marry them back up as soon as the injured units are healed. There's strength in numbers.

 

[JoeM]

My second great leader appeared when my hoplite defended against several Roman archers. Then their last archer attacked, slaying my hoplite and leader in one fell swoop...

So I was happy for about 1.5 seconds.

Pointless.

 

[Brasidas]

Hi All
My first post. I tried one wack at this game and got hammered but good. I expanded across the north of the island and extended some way south. The Romans expanded much more quickly than me and had a huge advantage in cities when I reached my maximum of about 8. They then began a series of 3 wars that eventually ended with the sack of Athens around 1200 AD. I lasted as long as I could but this game was over for me quite early on. I never did get hold of any iron, I briefly held some horses and lost them in the first Graeco-Roman War.

I realised when I was looking at the replay that the other guys were all exanding cities at about double the rate I was at the beginning and then triple the rate after that.

Evidently I was building workers and things instead of settlers. :crazyeyes

I am impressed that everyone on these threads have such a clear memory of what happened when. Its all a big blur to me now. I think if I take notes I might slow down some and make better decisions!
On the other hand, maybe not.

Oh well, I can't wait for the next one.

 

[Lemming]

yes, i did it ))

diplomatic victory 1505 AD, and i got my best score so far!

i conquered the romans about 600 AD and since then i was alone on that island, building up my cities, improving culture and go tech-trading...i was lucky and got a great leader so right when i got fission, i built the UN, held elections and it was a 5:2 vote for me with one abstain...YES!!!

 

[Smash]

Something FINALLY happened.Thank God too.
The previously neighborly Romans decided to make a grab fro the brass ring in 970AD.A dastardly sneak attack was immediately condemned and a world wide trade embargo against Rome was intiated.Soon the mutaul protection pact thing brought Roman ally India into the mix.
In the same year I traded for Magnetism launching me into the next age.A free advance brought Nationalism.
SO..the Roman "invasion" of horses,spears and longbows was decisively repulsed by riflemen,cannon and cavalry.
NO LEADER....but a golden age has begun(finally)
I did manage a wonder.Shake's.Whoopee!!!That city was building a wonder since almost the very beginning.Had to sac sheilds twice to avoid building a fp.I am just happy to have that city free.

 

[Essex]

4th Update

Well I'm in the 1400's now and the maniacal germans wiped out the indians about 100 years ago. I finally got to democracy a few turns ago to speed up my workers. For a while their I was getting techs at 4 turns per with over 1500 extra gold coming in per turn through tech trading but having to go into anarchy hurt this. The downside was I was unable to get a good tech lead. So I started a world war against the Enlish who were basically tied with me in tech. Declared war against them and bought alliances with every other civ. England seems to be being slowly worn down. I was hoping this would let me get a tech lead as the other civs should be going more for troops but the French are staying right with me and I'm not selling them techs Oh well. I just reached the modern ages and the plan is to invade the French hopefully while they are still mixed up with the English. I made one classic error though. I forgot ya need coal AND IRON to make railroad's and thinking the iron was useless I traded it away for per turn cash. Now I can't make railroads for another 15 turns I'm up to 100 workers now I believe and I think by the time those 15 turns are up they won't have anything left to do except make railroads. I'm hoping 50 modern armor backed up with some radar artillery will be enough to slaughter the french. Then with enough airports in my main continent I can just keep ferrying in reinforcements to wipe out the rest. I'm pretty sure I could get diplomatic or space race victory easily but a massive world war is gonna be a lot more fun.
I might even use nukes

 

[donsig]

In my last post I noted how the Third Roman War netted Greece one Roman city. Well, not long after signong the peace treaty Ceasar attacked starting the Fourth Roman War. After losing two cities I imported some German horses in an attempt to beat Ceasar at his own game. Also sent some hoplites into Roman territory to destroy property. After losing two cities and seeing Roman legions for the first time I was happy to give back the city gained in the last war.

Spent the rest of the moring researching republic and doing housework. Since my turns lasted 30 seconds and the AI took minutes I did the dishes, laundry and vacuuming while the computer played.

It's around 1350 AD now and Greece is a republic. Working on an economy. In the aftermath of the Roman wars Greece has two bloody iron and one ivory.

My humble goal now is to stay alive till the end.

 

[willemvanoranje]

Yes, yes, yes. I know, I know. I'm good. Romans gone, economy great, researching as well, on the edge of invading the Aztecs, and only dangerous rival the Indians. However, I gave the Germans chivalry and gunpowder and trade horses and iron to them (for about 12 gold per turn, 600 lump sum, and some luxury goods from them), so the Indies may get some trouble near their homeland. I'm about 200 points ahead of India, and to stay ahead I need to conquer the damn Aztec, which is a shame since they provide me with 46 gold every turn, only for Monotheism and some useless tech.

 

[Airness]

I am doing well in this game so far.

I took out Roman early and fast with horses. Had the whole island by myself for culture/econ building, had great city sites, one of my city sits in between 2 long rivers, and is generating tons of commerce...

Had luck with the ocean too, sent 2 galleys with horses up north, and 1 made to the Aztecs. Soon took control the Aztec island with city trading tricks lol. I heard that this island had some resource, hmm not bad. I was luck with a little skirmish with the Aztec and produced 1 leader. I rushed the Light House with him.

I left the Aztec capital alone, once a while I declare war on them, and attack some of their low tech units with my Elite units and tried to spawn leaders . I did get a leader doing this so far, and used him to build Sistine Chapel

They are so weak that i could declare war on them, killed couple their troops and get them to accept peach all in one turn

I was tempted to build the FP on the Aztec island cause good city formation, but did not see much green there(grass lands), so I decided to build the FP later on the biggest island cuase i sure would need some serious production there. And I had to keep fight

I soon landed on the main land where other civs reside. Quickly launched attack on the French cause they had the Pyrimid and a truck load of luxuries. I took one coastal city fast and rushed a harbor, barracks and library. My 5 galleys were busy ferrying the troops. I sent some horses to pillage the road connecting the irons to the French, so soon, they were fighting me with worriors instead with swordsman

I am 1 tech away from chiviry, and after i upgraded my horses to knights, i would be unstoppable.

My plan now is to get knights and take Paris. Hopefully i would get another leader for a FP in paris.

Other AIs were so poor this game, i could not get much gold from them trading tech/lux

You should always fight smart, and when ever you fight, use the best unit combo and go for the "leader Spawning" fights often.

1 or 2 leaders at key moments can turn the whole game around.

Airness

 

[Smash]

This game is definitely a war game.
Everything has kicked up a notch or two since the Romans attacked.They are no more and have provided me 20 odd cities.Big cites also.
In my golden age,I have went from 1st to distant first.
I now have the edge in tech and am completely safe on my home continent.1070AD now and only a couple techs left before modern times.
Right now I am bringing in over 2200 per turn from other civs.Its crazy.I am filthy rich and can't spend it fast enough.I am actually buying a few things from scratch.
The Roman wars were interesting.First campaign I captured 8 cities.4 turns later 5 of them had reverted back.Thats when I decided to eliminate them in 1 turn.I took 13 cities in 1 turn and that was that.
Not 1 leader!!!!.....

 

[Excilus]

Hello! My game started off pretty well, I expanded and formed a huge culture base by producing wonders only 2 settlers from my main city.

I managed to get a hold of an equal number of cities with the romans through good city sites, granaries, blocking strategies, and border pushing, and once they did move I built cities one tile closer. I expanded across the north of the starting continent.

In about 300-400ad I got contact with the french, and I played tech broker with everyone except the poor old romans. The romans did learn of the french only 10-20 turns after, but by that time I had taken 2-3 cities(big ones) through cultural expansion, and I had already switched all production to swordmen/catapults. The whole war was a massacre. I had declared war once te cities defeated which was when they revolted, and the reason why they revolted was because they went into anarchy.

I quickly took advantage of the situation. Leading a line style offensive with my swordmen and catapults(to prevent retaliation), I also figured that if they were in anarchy now, I could keep them in revolt if I made sure they had no luxuries. I could also keep them from producing anything but archers by pillaging thier resource trade routes with the french.

I sailed galleys in front of thier harbours, I pillaged all the roads around the capital, and for good measure I pillaged all thier resources too. The entire roman empire fell in 900 ad, and I had a huge cultural base and infrastructure aswell. I also came out with a gl in the process, which I later used to rush smiths.

Update:

After I Conquered the romans, I was left with many, many small cities with a pillaged infrastructure, or none at all, producing little in the means of commerce or production. I contacted all the other civs, and traded my ivory for their techs, thier techs for thier gold, thier gold for thier luxuries, all in the same turn. I also switched from monarchy to democracy, netting huge trade and production bonuses.

I sent a flottila of 3 caravels with 3 elite knights each to the aztec continent, I traded them some crappy techs for all thier gold, thier territory map, and then I traded thier contacts to everyone else. I then dropped 9 knights near the city witht the silks.

The war did not go as anticipated. The aztecs are apperantly quite eager to adopt new ideas, and got ahead of me in tech by trading with the other civs! I took the silk city, but after fighting the industrial might of the aztec empire for 10 turns with only 9 elite knights I decided to call it a century

I ended up with nearly all of my cities in WLTK day, further lowering corruption, and allowing one of my cities, in the dead center of the continent, in the best city position possible(2 cows, freshwater, horses, grassland), with 12 pop to be able to produce the forbidden palace in only 50 turns. Just 50! I ramped up production, set all city production to this: Improvement, Worker, Improvement, Worker. Brought sci advances upto 12 turns but was bringing in 400-600 cash a turn, allowing me to buy my improvements only 2 turns into them.

The rebuilding was completed by the time I got my forbidden palace up, and I hit the industrial revolution at that point also. I managed to have one source of coal, and railed the entire continent in something like 150 years. Since then my civ exploded. I have factories in all my towns, all of which are greater then 12 in size. I have every single wonder from the industrial revolution on. I have all the non-war buildings in all my cities.

I mobilized after constucting the hover dam, producing a tank in most of my cities every 2 turns, and made an airport in most of my towns, including the aztec spice town. I developed my navy from nothing to 9 Battleships, 8 Carriers(At 4 bombers a pop), 16 Destroyers, and 12 Transports in no more then 14 turns. I surrounded the aztec island with naval forces, shipped all my tanks and infantry by way of airport to the aztec spice town, upgraded my main continents defense, and landed several full transports of tanks, infantry, artillery, but mostly marines, onto the aztec coastal towns. The result: Total control within 8 turns.

At this point, I had just broken into the modern age, and had changed my entire infanry corps to mech infantry. I was getting a tech every 5 turns, more then 900 gold a turn, had research labs in all of my cities, and was beggining to get the pollution under control. I was regularly sabotaging the rival spaceships, and I've built seti and the UN. I have landed my army on germany, and I control berlin, frankfurt, lepzig, and basically everythign other then 2 small towns. Fighting germany made me go to war with england, which I allied against with india, which caused them to war with china, which means I have to fight with china, but then china fought india, which means they're at war with russia too.

I have a monoply on the rubber, most of the oil, and all of the uranium, so world domination seems quite possible. I'm also the most liked civ leader, which means a win for me is inevitable. I'm going to take over the world though, leaving one indian city in the middle of nowhere, and I'm going to rebuild the world until everyone is happy and there is no pollution, and I've railed all of it, and all my cities are huge.

I've currently got ~200 mech infantry, 3 mech infantry armies, ~60 Modern Armor, ~80 Marines, ~40 paratroopers, ~100 bombers, a huge navy, ~40 jet fighters, and am producing modern armor at a rate of 30 a turn, with an airport on all continents, so I'm set. I belive I can get a score around 7000 with that much land and people, with future tech, and a space race victory. I think this becuase I already have about 35% of the worlds landmass, 42% of the pop, and no future tech, or bonus of any kind. My score is climbing quickly after the takeover of the aztecs and the population growth i've been having.

My goal is to have the world by 1875 AD, and finish the rebuilding by 1925. My spaceship will launch 1950 AD, and I'll be one impaticient little boy awaiting, like christmas, the results of the gotm 2

 

[Smirk]

Geez all I can say is slooooooow! Don't think I've yet played such a non-offense civ with only 1 neighbor.

Starting area pretty much sucks. I used to scout around first, but stopped doing that, now I wish I did. At any rate I was able to get 2 moderate despot-rush cities on the 7 flood plains, actually placed on one of the plains so it would have fresh water, so that leaves 2 flood plains per city, which gets me a swordsman or hoplite every 2 turns.

I've been at war with rome since ~2000BC, a brief stop around 70BC, and then another at around 100AD. He doesn't give up.
I initially headed south along the coast, and then after getting iron working from rome, I started scouting and finally found the iron at 300BC or so, and amazingly rome had a city right beside it, but both irons were outside his non upgraded culture square. (I doubt it would have mattered, I would have just taken it)

Using despot-rush with those 2 flood plain cities I have plenty of defense, I got another flood plain city rushing over by the iron, so once I got my road hooked up, I rushed 3 swords and started the war of 300AD or something. He managed to cut 2 of my rush cities off after I got about 6 swords out, so I let him wear down the horsemen on my defense and then attacked to kill next round. I did this for many years until the tide of horses stopped. I caught up and entered the second age ahead of the romans, and with the free tech am slightly ahead. I have yet to hear of any finished second age wonders, so there might be 1% chance I can still get a leader and get sun tzu's. Im afraid to make contact now it could be bad. Its about 600AD and I've just started my clean up project of roman cities where I will be taking all of them.

Finished the romans off at 1000AD or so, and then begun the aztec genocide.... Rest posted at end of thread.

 

[Rhandom]

I lost in 1752 to the UN, just when I thought I had finally got ahead. Score 2158, which is actually my best for monarch.

The plan was to take the romans out, build the forbidden city with my great leader, then rush ahead with superior culture and tech towards a space victory.

Unfortunately, my war with rome wasn't as smooth as I had hoped, as a pair of regular spearmen wasted about 10 veteran archers and swordsmen in the first roman city (plains, size 8). I had made a 3 pronged attack, and that basically broke the center prong. The remaining swordmen had to fend off horsemen for about 20 turns before they could get enough control to move onto rome. A similar but less dramatic defense of the first roman city on my east front (following the eastern edge of the continent south) held up that flank for about 10 turns - you'd think 5 swordsmen could take two spearmen ina size 3 city.

The western edge fell rapidly, letting me capture 3 cities in quick sucession with few losses.

Finally though, I crushed through to rome, and the rest fell rapidly. I had not realized how many cities they had South and west of rome, they would never trade me a map.

But, I never got a great leader, even with 40+ wins by elites. So I had to build the palace closer into the greek cities, and it took about 100 years longer than I planned. Never went to war again, traded very well for techs and resources, ending with all 8 luxuries coming through trade. I was just behind the french for score and tech - if I could have got that palace off , I'm sure I could have won.

 

[donsig]

Well, that's FINALLY over and now I can go on with life and install the patch.

This game took forever and I was the smallest civ on my map! I took last place in the scoring but survived while three AI civs were wiped out...

After the Roman Wars I determined to survive as a republic. The World Wars started in the early 1600's but Greece stayed nuetral throughout. (Read: Greece paid whatever blackmail was demanded regardless of which side doing the demanding.) Rome, Russia and the Aztecs were fighting England (which had the UN and Manhattan), Germany, France, Japan and China.

Meanwhile I tried sailing settlers to every niche left outside Rome's borders - only to have half turn back because the Roman borders expanded. I tried building up my pathetic culture. Got to republic and left science at minimum to get cash to buy improvements. Lost several cities to the Romans through cultural desertion, though some flip-flopped over the centuries. I lost all my western possesions (around the iron). One of the iron had run out though I wasn't even using it! (Had given up building swordsmen long before and never got to railroads.:crazyeyes )

Finally got to upgrade my galleys and was at the point of bringing in about 100 gold per turn. Made trades for luxuries - think I had them all at one time. Lots of happy Greeks for a little while anyway.

In 1730 one of my cities revolted but they were so pathetic even the Romans didn't want them!

Someone must have switched sides in the World War for Germany destroyed Japan in 1758. China killed of Russia in 1804 while the peaceful Indians succumbed to the Chinese in 1816. I had finally upgraded to galleons and was in the midst of a switchover to democary when the UN vote came up. I was so sick of the game I voted for Elizabeth. (There was no way I would have voted for Ceasar!) The English got the win though the Romans had a higher score! Fittingly Greece ended the game in anarchy and right on the heels of having two more city Romanized...

Boy, I can't wait to play a diety level GOTM.

 

[Email]

Finally finished my first GOTM yesterday with a diplomatic victory in 1520 - a lot better than I would have hoped for.

I started the game good and found a settler in my first hut, meaning I was the first civ to build 2nd city. Athens was build on the starting spot, which proved to be good enough for a capital. Sparta was built on the coast to the northeast, getting control of the gold mine.

I was even first to build the 5th city and managed to keep the upper edge on the romans, although he took control of both irons. Both the romans and I continued to expand peacefully on the huge land-mass and got about 60% of the land and control of most spices and ivory until all was build. I managed to build Colossus, Great Lighthous and Hanging Gardens, but missed out on the Pyramids to Rome, which ment I had a good reason to fight them.

From now on I started to build hordes of hoplites and horsemen and started planning my attacks. I captured 3 roman cities at the first wave and quickly declared peace. Now he was pumping out legionaires and I decided to make a quick attack at their iron-city. Once I took that city, the rest of the war was easy and at 800 AD the romans was wiped out from the planet and I had control over the complete island, contact with all civs and democracy coming in in one turn. I changed to democracy and pumped out workers all over the island, trading for science while I was researching new one's in 4 turns. I was behind 2-3 sciences when the war ended, but at 1300 AD I built Theory of Evolution and established myself as the most advanced in the world (I was already the largest, in cities, land mass and population). At 1520 I built United Nations and was immediately chosen as the secretary general. Total score: 4973

Summary: A lucky start with the settler made me get quick control of the romans which was essential in this game. The iron is not all that important to push for, but it is important to get it once you start fighting, so launch your first attack their. About the wonders, getting the Lighthouse should be the main focus. This will mean that you get contact with all other civs, while the romans will not, and never ever trade away contact with the romans. Once you get control over the complete island you have pretty much won the game. Stay peaceful and focus on science and defense. Trade to catch up with the other civs after the war and then you will be the leader in all areas.

Note: Game was played without patch

 

[donsig]

I agree, the iron wasn't all that important to secure. Ceasar kicked my butt without the iron. I played way too conservatively at first. I built barracks so I would have veteran hoplites to defend. This put me way behind the AI in number of cities. The replay showed I only had one-third the cities Rome did when I attacked. Add to that the fact that the Roman cities were on grassland and the Greek on plains...