Civ3 GOTM #1 *Spoiler* talks

[searay0]

Sorry, I meant victory in 1685, not 1865.

And is there a rule about minimum turns to get some techs? Sometimes it seems even though I have the science output to get something in only a few turns sometimes the game caps me so that no matter how much I increase my science rate my gold per turn goes down but my turns per science doesn't. Is there a minimum and/or maximum turns for each tech instituted to try to keep your tech close to that which is appropriate for the calendar year?

 

[donsig]

I survived and won the first Civ III GOTM. It was an ugly win (histograph, score in 700s) and judging by the other posts in this thread it is no where near the top efforts.

It was a war torn game and once I became a monarchy I stayed that way till the bitter end. And the end was bitter. There was one island where I had three cities connected by railroad but only two infantry to guard them. The Aztecs landed a single cavalry. I planned to kill off the cavalry but got involved in other parts of the map and forgot. The lone rider entered the city where Cyrus the Great had built the forbidden palace and the evil Aztecs razed the city! Thus my only producing cities were in Persia proper, which consisted of the three cities I had built. These were busy building units to fight the Aztecs on the main continent. A terrible businees complicated by the fact that the Iriquois invaded Persia proper a few times. Once they captured one of my original cities but I took it right back. I was trying to rebuild its infrastructure when the purple forces came back. I made a quick peace with the Aztecs and moved back north. Managed to kill everything save two cavalry which were reduced to one hp each. Once of these units limped into my beloved Persian city and burned it to the ground. I barely rebuilt it before the end.

Fighting a war when both have infantry is a pretty wasteful affair. Reminded me of WW I! I did manage to retake the old Aztec capital - through cultural takeover! I had used my artillery to isolate it from the other Aztec cities (by destroying all roads, etc. around it).

Hope to do better next time...

 

[Primetym]

I decided that in my GOTM I would take over the starting island, as most people did, but then I sat back and didn't try to win by conquest. I had my main island, I spread out over onto some other islands, and then I just researched and built some wonders and things. In the end I won by histograph score and my end score was around 1350 or something like that. I was happy just to survive, especially since I am new to the Civ series entirely.

Jeff

 

[Hobbes]

Finished the game this weekend with a domination victory. The country I went to war with first, was the last one I had to finish off (Aztecs). Something strange happened in this game, the Iroquois civ committed suicide. They had one city left, and I took it over through culture, when I did the message popped up that Iroquois civilization destroyed by Persians (I wish the Aztecs would have gone that easy).

Strategy: Rush build temples for quick culture, happy citizens and large borders, and barracks for veteran immortals. Most important of all, play the diplomacy game (Abe Lincoln probably still thinks that I will love him forever).

 

[Taé Shala]

I won the game by conquest until 750AD.

Made 4261 points.

I think the most important fact was, that I started early fleet-building.
I had been able to carry my Immortals fast to the other islands after I took the first island.

Here are my strategies:
*Build up your fleet.
*Don´t wait to long for the others to find you; go out and find them by yourself.
*Don´t stay in front of a city you cannot capture; carry your fleet to another city and see opponents army divide.
* Rush production. (Most of my cities didn´t increase beyond 3 citizens).
* Stay in despotism.
* Build immotals; let your people pray to their gods in the battlefield; your don´t need any tempels.

Always remember: If they are to strong, you are to weak.

 

[minderbinder]

Tae Shala, did you notice what your score was the turn before you took over the world? I am just curious what the bonus is for an ealry victory.

Searay, I read in one of the other forums that there is a minimum research time (~4 turns I think).

 

[donsig]

I had no fleet to speak of in this game. The last fifty years or so I didn't even have one lousy ship! That fried my taters, too, especially when the AI civs attacked my island conquests!

I did stay on monarchy the whole game and never once used my people to rush build anything. (I did use a great leader to build a forbidden palace.) I never drafted any citizens or changed from the 'normal' economy either. (Can one draft or mobilize while in monarchy?) I tried giving my people happiness and culture but it seems the best thing a can do for his people is abdicate in favor of a republic or democracy.

 

[Cruise]

From my experience early victories are the key to get high scores.

 

[Pggar]

Originally posted by EEKthedog
From my experience early victories are the key to get high scores.

It sure is. I thought of giving my people some culture, and I began to improve my empire. What a waste of time. When I saw my score wasn't going anywhere, I decided to kill everybody. I finished the game by killing all the other civs in 2014. Score: 1343 (RIDICULOUS!!!) . If there's someone still playing, war is the way to go. Destroy the AI as soon as possible. I believe this score system is even worst than civ2. If we don't change it, every GOTM will be a race to see who finishes (and I mean winning) the game earlier.

 

[Lucky]

This is my second post after writing about the Civ2 GOTM10 an also my second Civ3 game, first one to finish.
Living in Germany ment getting Civ3 in the middle of November. That´s why I didn´t have enough time to finish it in any other way than early conquest.
Persepolis was founded on the coast with access to fish. I had a lot of luck with my first hut to the south, which gave me Pasargadae. While exploring the island further to the south I met the Aztecs and later also Babylonians and Zulus. They were all very eager to trade technology with me.
While researching Iron Working my warriors including some veterans were able to capture the Aztec capital and another town to the south. A fortified pikemen on a hill next to their only city left kept destroying their units until I could capture it.
A little later the first immortals began waging war against Babylon and Zululand capturing many workers on the way.
At the same time my triremes with some warriors began exploring the treacherous seas finding the Iroquis and American empires and several goodie huts.
Soon a seaborne invasion began with shipping my immortals to their island. The consequent wars didn´t last too long and soon the world was mine.

 

[JoeM]

There's been a lot of people complaining about cities reverting to their original civ on other threads, but I haven't had much experience of it.

I'm wondering if anyone had any problems in this game with cities reverting after you conquered them, when you have loads of troops stationed in them or some such.

The one time it happened to me was one of their cities right next to their capital, but I only had one injured immortal in there so I wasn't bothered/suprised.

Incedentally, I'm going for a space race win as everyone else has gone for domination. Am I destined for a puny score?

 

[donsig]

One Aztec city reverted three times on me! Never lost a big garrison there though. I later took the Aztec capital and lost four of my five catapults when it reverted. The Americans later captured the old capital from me only to have it revert back to the Aztecs. Near the end of the game I laid seige to that same city once again. My artillery destroyed all the surrounding improvements and the city reverted to me!:crazyeyes

 

[JoeM]

Catapults would be no loss to me! They're useless when Immortals actually do the job properly...

I've decided to keep the Aztecs, Americas and Iroquois alive, and through RoP agreements I'm blockading their ports!

Mind you my Sub lost out to an Aztec Galley...Doh!

 

[Taé Shala]

Checked my Score before I won by conquest.

It was only 361. So I got 3900 bonus points.
(Seems I got one for each soul I sacrificed. )

 

[DuckManX]

what is gotm?

 

[Dirty Clint]

I just won a conquest victory in 170AD. I don't usually play for conquest but was pushed for time and love those immortals. I don't like the scoring system though as it seems very biased towards early conquest and I would rather build a large civ and win by spaceship. I think there is too much luck involved in an early conquest for it to be so highly score biased.
For example getting a settler in that first goody hut is such a large advantage and doubles your production rate. I also came accross the Aztecs city with my warrior and defeated it in one go.
Such luck in the early game makes a huge difference, especially on a small map.
I think that the longer a game go's on and the larger the map make for more skilled games, and think that like others have suggested limiting the victory conditions is a great idea. I'm looking forward to the next game as an early conquest (or a win at all, LOL) looks very difficult, and I suspect that a late conquest win won't have much more of a bonus than any other victory.

 

[JoeM]

Just won domination through cultural expansion....in 1858!

I'd totally blockaded all competition through right of passage agreements, 3 turns from the Apollo mission, set for a Space Race win probably around 1900.

Then bang, one of my tiny cities borders, in the middle of nowhere, expands and I win by domination - no fair!

This will be at the bottom of the charts no doubt, hours and hours I put in to win by space race from 700AD rather than domination.

 

[Quetzalcoatl]

I couldn't get my game submitted this weekend. My ISP was down on Sunday.
Overall I did pretty well in GOTM 1, I think.
COnquest victory in 940 AD with 3963 pts. I should have won about one hundred years earlier, but attempted conquest of Iriquois& American main continent with too few troops, and my conquests reverted back to Iriquois. Still, I'm quite pleased with my first GOTM submission.

 

[Kev]

Man, those conquest victories seem to be the way to go for GOTM scores. I was taking my time and soaking up the atmosphere too much. I won by domination in the early 1800's and I was kinda having fun chasing around the Americans as they settled the smaller islands of the world. I was building some wonders and just getting geared up for a space race. I even had a great leader languishing about - hadn't decided if I wanted to use it for the U.N., for a quick Apollo build, or some other deal.

My "domination" will be no where near the dates and scores of the conquest victors.

Is there some scoring deal that gives a conquest victory more points? Not sure if it was mentioned already and I missed it.

 

[Pggar]

The age bonus is the real great deal in scoring. I won by conquest and got a pity score since it was too late.