Civ6 6otM 03 After Actions Report

[Half Nelson]

Turn 180 Religious victory.
Immense frustration at finish date as it took 35 turns to find and convert the last AI (Norway):- closest I have come to rage-quit a Civ game in many years. From turn 100 I went on a conquest of Pericles Greece (the only serious religious challenger), then spammed Apostles (getting around 200 Faith per turn at this point) and used Proselytizer / Translator pairs to stamp out other foundling religions. I made contact with France at turn 130 and, after switching research to Cartography, sailed over to convert her heathen flock. But where was the last AI? Assuming (incorrectly due to mounting frustration) that I had erased all other religions, I spammed triple-strength Translator Apostles and sent them to all corners of the world, but I seem to have missed my AI quarry at least twice by taking wrong turns when virtually upon them. I eventually found Harald of Norway surrounded by hordes of barbarians in the far NE corner of the map. It then took over 25 turns to bring sufficient forces to suppress the barbarians and allow my Apostles to do their work. Harald actually had founded his own religion and spread it to all his cities and I had the wrong combination of Apostles to deal with this quickly:- a combination of Heathen Conversion / Proselytizer would have saved me over 20 turns. My initial Apostle escorts struggled to make headway through the barbarian hordes:- poor old Harald!

 

[bbbearbbb]

Turn 164 Religious victory.

- How many cities did you settle or capture?
Captured 2, settled 7, on the western side of the continent.
- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Some military to handle barbs, and then to knockout England. Focused on religion but got sidetracked into Industrial Zones which wasn't really needed, should have just gone Holy Sites and Commercial Hubs.
- Did You get the first religion?
Yes, via Stone Henge. Greece and Brazil had the other religions (only 3 in the game). Missionaries were useful for converting own cities and some CS, Apostles used for other Civs down to last charge, and then used for theological combat.
One interesting tactic I stumbled upon, is placing religious units on Greece (Sparta) Holy Sites, so that when their Prophet popped, they had nowhere to found a religion. In hindsight, I might have been able to do this to the other two civs and been the only religion in the game!
- How much warring did you do?
After about turn 30 it was all peaceful.
- Were City-States helpful?
Yerevan and the other religious CS were very useful, ended up suzerain of about 5.
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
France was on an island, but had several cities and expanded to the continent (where I met them). Norway was tougher to find and only had one city.
- Did you enjoy the game?
Yes, was a great game and my first religious victory!
- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
Peace for the last 150 turns.

 

[guilheotavio]

Religious Victory Turn 260

Hi guys.

I finished Game of The Month 03 and I think this one was the easiest one yet. Even though I couldn't get Stonehenge, I was the second one to found a religion. Then, to get a lot of faith per turn, I chose Desert Folklore for Patheon and Pilgrimage as a founder belief. I also chose the belief Holy Order to buy religious units cheaper. Besides that, my strategy was to be the suzeran of Yerevan. Every aplostle I bought, I chose the promotion that eliminates other religions when converting the city. With a few Aplostles, I would go into the civs that Had found a religion, position at leat one Apostle in every single one of their cities and in the same turn I would activate all of them, completely erasing that Religion from the world.

So, a few more things; Gorgo was very annoying in this game. Almost every turn she would either praise me or threat me. She was very confused, aparentley she loved me and hated me at the same time. I had converted all the civs in the world before I could even find France. When I found it,I just had to convert Paris to win the game, they were obviously doing pretty bad with only one or two cities. I observed that barbarians were still giving them a lot a problems in the late game. At some moment in the early game, England declared war on me when they could have done a lot of damage or they could even have taken my capital, but Victoria gave up in the moment my single archer killed one of her units (I think she had 6 units)

 

[Skele]

Turn 207 - Score 333

This was my first time completing a GotM, and also the first time I've ever gone for a religious victory. It was definitely a learning experience and there are a lot of things I could've done differently to save a lot of time. England declared war on me early and I conquered them, but otherwise I was going for a peaceful victory. My plan was to build up my faith bank and try to convert the entire world simultaneously because I was afraid someone might get mad and declare war on me, slowing my progress. I waited waaay longer than I had to, though... by the time the game was over, I had 5000 faith in excess and several apostles doing nothing. I guess I need to pay a lot more attention to budgeting my faith... Barbarians surrounding France also barred me from a win still in the high 100s.

I also learned that I should really put some effort into learning all the different suzerain bonuses. I wasn't aware of how incredibly awesome Yerevan's was until I got it by accident. Being able to pick which promotion you want is immensely helpful.

 

[Falabello]

Ok, so this is officially a bug.

See my earlier post (#28) for an idea of what I'm talking about. I've done some testing to figure this out, and it appears that if you successfully convert your last civilization while you are at war with them, then the religious victory will not trigger. That was the problem with my original save.

Anyway, at a minimum, I wanted to at least make others aware of this particular religious victory bug.

Yes, that was also my problem. I guessed I won at 1210AD, but as the victory didn't come, I continued playing trying to understand what was happen. So I gave up and would not submit the game. This way I opened this thread and read the explanation from Bob TheRabbit. While in war with France, I immediatilly converted one city after conquering it. As I continued the game, I just have the autosave turn 189 - 1280AD. So, I'm submitting it. If possible, I still want to participate of the results, considering this date.

 

[leif erikson]

Okay, same for you, 1210 AD it is.

 

[joyodongo]

Turn 200 - Religious Victory

Same as many others: conquered London, peaceful game since then, founded 6 cities and had a hard time finding where the last civ (France was).

 

[kask]

Turn 345 Religious victory. score 458

- How many cities did you settle or capture?
Captured 2 settled 7, on the west from Pericles.
- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
holly sites only at most
- Did You get the first religion?
Yes, via Stone Henge. foused after for malbodhi and mount saint michel....
- How much warring did you do?
not really just beat up Pericles and voila.
- Were City-States helpful?
Yerevan, jerusalem and la venta, hard work vs england and pericles but was able to be soveraint.
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
France of course with only Paris !!!!.
- Did you enjoy the game?
Yes, was a great game and my first religious victory!
- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
almost all at peace and friends with 4...

 

[starauschek]

Won the game after 317 rounds in 1892

- How many cities did you settle or capture?
9

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
focus on research and religious districts

- Did You get the first religion?
No, couldn't build stonehenge first

- How much warring did you do?
1 war against england (wiped them out except for one city)

- Were City-States helpful?
a lot in the beginning, but not so much in the later phases

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
fought religious battles for the first time, nice plot

- Did you enjoy the game?
Absolutely, my first religious victory. winning video sequence is great!

- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
tried to maintain peace but AI plays crappy

 

[nikAlto]

T153 victory. And first GOTM submission!

I reckon i could have got around a T135 victory - but got stuck behind with researching celestial navigation, then only found france on t140 and norway on t143. Then arabia got a late game religion so had to send apostles back to reconvert. That slowed me down. I think i had a bug too - as normally i monitor other civs great prophet points. But after 3 religions that option disappeared - with the message that all of those great people taken. But that clearly wrong. And then up pops arabia with a religion late game. Grrr.

- How many cities did you settle or capture?
captured only 1 - London - and founded 4. Didn't think i needed any more than that to shoot for a quick victory

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Research I mainly just bounced around the eurekas. I messed up with celestial navigation. I thought simply being allowed to embark meant i could cross an ocean. Wrong. So once i realised i needed to go over ocean to get to France, i had to research celestial navigation which took 18 turns. Had not focussed on science production at all.

- Did You get the first religion?
No - Gorgo got the first. I got the second. I have practiced a few religious victories. Used to panic about getting first religion, but actually think second is fine and founding the first would not have made a difference to my victory speed (although other things would have - as mentioned elsewhere in this post).

- How much warring did you do?
I DOWd on Victoria for London. Then peaceful for the rest of the game. I was left alone by the other civs. This is very different to a practice game i did on a random map with random civs, but with this set up. Other civs DOWd on me in that game when i converted their cities. No one seemed to mind so much in this game.

- Were City-States helpful?
Yerevan very helpful, being able to pick any promotion for apostle. This is incredible really - very powerful.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
Civs very peaceful. Even Gorgo. Also - none of the other civs with religions made any attempt to spread it, although i was super fast in converting any civ which founded a religion. So maybe they didn't have a chance.

- Did you enjoy the game?
Yes. A lot. I also thought the map was great. Good starting point and was fun finding the civs in far flung places, even though it slowed me down.

- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
Only took one city in war (and didn't wipe out Victoria, kept her alive). So all conversions through peace and love and apostles.

 

[kcd_swede]

Religious victory Turn 224, 1565AD

slow going at the end to reach the Norwegians.

 

[amh52]

Turn 205 - Religious Victory

- How many cities did you settle or capture?
Settled 5, captured 7

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Focused on Religion

- Did You get the first religion?
No second. Built 2 Holy Sites

- How much warring did you do?
Took out England early. Later Pericles declared and I took most of his cities.

- Were City-States helpful?
Yes, especially the religious ones.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
I was expecting way more religious battles.

- Did you enjoy the game?
Yes, except I couldn't find the last Civ

- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
A bit of both, mostly peace

 

[tommynt]

won turn 84 - but cant upload save again.
pretty strightforward game.
Built 2 army both consisting of 3 slingers ( later archers) and a warri.
Sent 1 west one east - then holy site and campus.
Just when at about turn 70 I had killed all civ close and was sending missionaries and Units all over world in every directions to find last 2 civs - france found me.
Got no clue if france found a coastal way which i did not find to me or had researched marine thing with this pity 4 size city before me - but somehow there was a galley at my coast.
After that it was just finishing tech to cross ocean and spread. Wiking posiion was pretty obvious - still I had missionaries going into all ocean everywhere before just to be sure not to miss some island nation.
I did swim in faith with all those reli cs and stone faith - so I did pump out one missionary kinda every turn.

AI is even more horribad at fighting as in previous civ versions

edit: build order:
worker, 3 slingers, holy site, worker, shrine, 3 slingers and a warri, campus and lib, useless stuff (some units)

 

[Justus II]

GOTM3 – Victory Turn 180, Score 272
Achieved a Religious Victory after turn 180. (See my Turn 100 post HERE).

Spoiler FinalScore :

How many cities did you settle or capture?
Settled 4, captured 4 (all from Pericles). I planned to stick with the 4 core cities, but when Pericles declared on me, I decided to capture as I went to get the Iron and Horses, and a couple Holy Sites. However, I should have stopped at 3 (as you’ll see later).

Spoiler Final Map :

What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Initial tech priorities were Astronomy, then headed for Apprentice (thinking this would be a longer game). After that I ended up researching some techs for military units (Samurai, Crossbow) due to the AI wars, and then to Cartography once I realized France had to be an island. I also researched techs for a couple wonders (Petra and Hagia Sophia).

Culture focused on Political Philosophy, then Theology. By turn 100 I was working toward Feudalism, then went for Monarchy and Theocracy.

Did you get the first religion?
Got the second (Pericles got Stonehenge, I went the Holy Site path). My plan was to contain him initially (he got touchy about me converting his city) and convert everyone around him. In a great stroke of timing, Gorgo discovered the 3rd religion (Taoism) on turn 114, just as I was about to convert her cities, my apostles converted them within 2 turns, so it never got off the ground.

Spoiler Taoism :

Brazil discovered Catholicism on turn 139, but I was able to re-convert Rio before he could spread it. Saladin of course founded Islam last, but a couple apostles were enough to kill off a few missionaries and then convert Cairo.

How much warring did you do?
I didn’t initiate any, I wanted a peaceful game. Pericles declared on me turn 114 (religious war), after weathering the first wave (I didn’t recognize right away he had taken Suzerain on Yerevan, so I had to fight off their units too), I took Mycenae and walked down his cities one by one. After capturing his 3rd city, I saw he had founded a 4th on the far side of Valetta. I should have just accepted a peace deal and refocused on religion, but his new city had 3 luxuries and I got caught up in hunting him down. Not only did it distract me, when I finished off his final city everyone hated me, triggering another war when Saladin and Pedro attacked me on turn 164. I destroyed most of the visible Brazil units (Saladin never reached me before peace), but didn’t feel like going after his cities (they were already Shinto). The last war was a surprise attack by Liz on turn 177, on what I thought would be the last turn… turns out Harald had founded a new city. We had Open Borders and Liz had units all over my territory, luckily I had crossbows garrisoning most of my cities and cleared out her warriors, and the game ended a few turns later.

Were City-States helpful?
Yes, I focused on the religious ones, but after reading some other reports I should have pushed to maintain Suzerain over Yerevan. I also started working on some of the industrial ones, but never got around to building the industrial zones to get the benefits.

Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
As others have mentioned, did not expect France on an island, or that it would be so hard to find Norway and Saladin. I should have focused on scouts and naval techs much earlier. I had played a religious game before, so most of the mechanics didn’t surprise me, but I was expecting more religious warfare, and a longer game, so I spend more time developing my cities than I needed to. Also, I assumed the Warrior would upgrade to Samurai, but they didn’t (looks like nothing does).

Did you enjoy the game?
Yes, it was good to put into practice my realization from my last religious game that the key is to convert their holy sites first. The AI surprise attacks were a distraction but they were interesting, gave me something to do while waiting to find France and Norway.

Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
I was spreading the word by peace, but I was generally met with the sword!

 

[koutalis]

Religious Victory in T175 1140 AD , score 249
first 100 turns described here: Civ6 6otM number 03 Opening actions
- How many cities did you settle or capture?
Founded 6 cities ( 1 after T100) and captured 2 from the English
- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
In the beginning I went for PP and then Monarchy > Theology. For Techs, I made sure to get the samurais and in the late game Industralization.
- Did You get the first religion?
Yes, from Stonehedge
- How much warring did you do?
I only fought with the English. I started the war to prevent them from settling, but it was very easy to win both their cities. AFter that, I never fought anyone, but I did keep a deterrent force just in case the denouncements got real.
- Were City-States helpful?
Yes. Brussels helped with the wonders, Yerevan with selecting the Proselytizer promotion for the Apostles (absolutely best promotion, especially useful on other holy cities.)
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
the only thing delaying the victory was that the French were on the other side of the map, separated by water. I had to research caravels, and then I send a couple of Apostles, together with an army, in case they could not be converted.
- Did you enjoy the game?
I feel i made very good decisions in the beginning and made the game easy.the first 120 turns were very exciting. Then it was a fight with the terrain and slow movement of the units on the map.
- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
Early war to get a good start, then building up on faith and pumping out apostles. Wonders helped a lot coupled with the divine inspiration and Mosque. Stonedge, Mahabodhi temple with Yerevan special ability. 3rd apostle used for Holy order enhancement.

NOTE: in order to be able to evangelize you must have spend only 1 charge, even if your total available charges are 4. Bug?

Spoiler Budhism :

 

[isopaha]

Turn 204 win.
First religious game, seems to be much faster than scientific at least on this level. Would have had enough faith much earlier and should have focused more on scouting and finding all civs by turn 120 or something. Should have kept a small army e.g. to eradicate barbarians that had surrounded Paris, could have reached it faster. Norway and India DoWed me, but I could still convert their cities during wartime without any actual fighting. Took London early in the game, since England DoWed me.

 

[Landos]

Turn 166 Win.
How many cities did you settle or capture?
Founded 6 cities, captured 2
- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
In the beginning, I prioritized mining -> astrology, got commercial hubs then filled in. I wasn't worried about science since I hoped to be done long before science became an issue
- Did You get the first religion?
No, 2nd
- How much warring did you do?
I only fought with the English. Brazil & France both DoW'd me in the last 7 turns, and since I still needed to convert Paris, I thought that might be a problem. But the AI being what it is, just strolled my apostle up beside 2 heavy chariots, spread 2x and won
- Were City-States helpful?
Yerevan, the promotion choice is killer for the religious game
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
Like everyone else, the French were my surprise. I did not have any intention of researching caravels until I found out I had to,and I lost 3 apostles not being careful about barbarians when I point & click sent them to Paris-
- Did you enjoy the game?
Absolutely. What a fun map, and the french surprise was nice
- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
Well, the religion was spread through love, but only after i genocided the british. After turn ~110 I only build holy prayers to pump faith in each city. Oh, I did build an encampment and have my cap do that festival to get great general points when I lost suzerain of Yerevan and they wanted a great general.

 

[Stilgar08]

Turn 164 1030 AD - Religious Victory - patch 1.0.0.56 kicked in at turn 144 - shouldn't have had much of an impact on my game though...
Score 270 (? - not sure here - they really should take into account the turns taken to win - I got Dan Quayle )

- How many cities did you settle or capture?
settled 4 cities although the last one didn't matter much anymore - captured 2 cities from England in the first 100 turns to get some air to breeze...
- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
switched to Monarchy although there wasn't a war on turn 126 - because I could! - Went for Theocracy naturally - got it at turn 145 - didn't need as much faith as I got though (156 after Theocr. - 196 in the end) - used Scripture, Simultaneum and additionally Religious Orders in the Wildcard-Slot - had slight problems with housing after that due to lack of Insulae
- Did You get the first religion?
Nope - and I didn't try - Left out Stonehenge and went for Holysite right away in my capital - I was second
- How much warring did you do?
Just against England. Pericles teamed up with Pedro and they came up turn 125 and declared on me - I built a few units but nothin ever happened...
- Were City-States helpful?
Yerevan was the key to me: Just select Proselytizer and you are good to go! - I extincted religion in the fresh Holy Cities of the other religions with these guys and they couldn't spread their religion anymore.
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?

Spoiler :

Getting to France was the hardest - I even researched Cartography to help me out on it. It worked - Thankfully I went there with some Samurai in addition to the apostles - Barbs gave Cathy a hard time....

Another surprise to me is that barbs don't go after religious units much... I lost one Inquisitor near France... When I didn't have cartography I tried to get to France by land but there were some barb-camps NW of Harald so I simply embarked with my religous units and they left me alone. Barbs should really get after religious units and land units should kill unescorted apostles in the water... would help navy importance too, generally speaking.

Concerning score I get the feeling religion doesn't count much... I have 8 points for it...

- Did you enjoy the game?
Yep. Was fun. And my fastest win ever - as I said - I usually "play around" more not focusing to much one one VC...
- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
Peaceful game more or less and a bit proselytizing

Spoiler pics :

 

[Morningcalm]

Turn 175 1140 AD Religious Victory, played post-winter patch

- How many cities did you settle or capture?
Settled 7 cities, captured 5 (London, Athens, Ephesus, Rio de Janeiro, Recife).

- What did you prioritize for research and policies?
Early on I prioritized war. War helps expand borders with ease (without having to deal with the AI getting too many cities). It turned out this was all good, because the AI declared war on me first--Victoria and Pericles declared on me on the same turn (No idea if it was under an alliance or what not).

Later I prioritized sea exploration techs, as I couldn't even build harbors but had immense difficulty finding the last civ (turns out it was Catherine, hiding away north).

For policies, I picked the extra recon XP one early as I thought my scout (the first thing I made) would be key to dealing with a standard map (normally I play Small Immortal/Emperor maps). Later on, I chose God King for the early pantheon, then the extra influence policy to get Yerevan on my side as soon as possible (it was really fortunate I bumped into them so early). I also picked the Great Scientist 2 point bonus for my wild card policy, which helped me get the naval techs with due speed to find the remaining AI (Catherine).

- Did You get the first religion?
No. Greece (Pericles) got the first with Stonehenge. I didn't bother with Stonehenge, as I didn't think there would be enough time to finish it, so I chose God King as a policy for the early pantheon and constructed the holy site as I attacked London.

- How much warring did you do?
Quite a bit. I was planning to convert everyone by the sword, and it turns out Victoria and Pericles wanted some. So I killed them and then decided to go peacefully for the rest, as the AI wasn't aggressively settling cities.

- Were City-States helpful?
Yerevan was key. I picked the Translator and Proselytizer promotions most for my Apostles. It helped to have extra faith from the other religious city-states too. I was generating over 260 faith per turn by game's end.

- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it?
I had difficulty finding the last two AIs (Saladin and Catherine). I found Norway to the east as expected, but Catherine in particular proved very hard to find. Realizing she might be on another landmass (I reached the frozen north of my landmass, which was covered in barbarians), I quickly switched over to naval techs and speedily got them with Great Scientists.

Barbarians kept attacking my escorted apostles and the ships were actually wrecking my units (two apostles died IIRC). So I send around escorted apostles along different routes and tried to distract the barbarians with extra military units (floating an archer or scout onto the sea). Didn't work though. Barbarian ships targeted my apostles first.

After conquering many cities early on, I ran into money problems. Picking the -1 unit maintenance policy really helped bring everything back online, and I also traded luxuries for small amounts of gold per turn to deal with that.

- Did you enjoy the game?
Quite! Even though it was on Prince (which is VERY easy), I liked the challenge of trying to finish as fast as possible. I should probably have started exploring the world a lot sooner--after conquering two civs I mostly sat around dealing with domestic issues (so my units wouldn't disband). Turns out the 1 unit maintenance reduction was key.

- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword?
A bit of both. At first I thought killing everyone would be the easy way, but I found peaceful conversion just as easy, without the risk of having to deal with war weariness/killed apostles, etc.

 

[arenquinha]

Religious Victory; Turn 232 Score 232

How many cities did you settle or capture? Settled 5, including the capitol
- What did you prioritize for research and policies? Went for Stonehenge followed by all the religious builds
- Did You get the first religion? Yes, via Stonehenge
- How much warring did you do? I was the target of several attacks by English/Greeks
- Were City-States helpful? Not particularly, fought most of the time with English over holding Jerusalem
- Any surprises you ran into, how did you deal with it? I'm surprised by a lot of other after actions, but in game nothing out of the ordinary. Forgot I knew where France was so I was late in trying to convert them.
- Did you enjoy the game? Always enjoy these GOTM's
- Spread the word thru peace and love, or conversion by the sword? Peace and love