COTM 11: First Spoiler

[ionimplant]

One again, I missed getting to philosophy first. This makes 4-5 COTMs in a row! I later traded for Monarchy and switched to that after a 4 turn anarchy in 530BC. I continued to expand and fill in the pennisula reaching the MA in 270BC by researching currency. I got Engineering as my free tech.

950 BC Philosophy (research)

did you do full-out research? with only 2 cities, i managed to get philosophy at free republic at 1000BC, before which i deviated to get CB and mysticism.

 

[solenoozerec]

Predator
Goal: fastest domination (as always until I succeed).

I moved north, found a lake and settle there.
My first build was a curragh (I thought we are on the island), this curragh almost completed a trip around the world within QSC time and brought contacts with 4 other civs, later I contacted Mongols and I found Japan only after 1000BC.

Although I did not get a map of this world, it gave me a clue that the world is very *beep* (cenzored).

In 1790BC I was somewaht shoked by regent AI research capability. Dutch new writing. We didn't. In 1750 two other civs knew writing. I was scared, yet I decided to research CoL before researching philosophy. At some point I become so scared that started to use scientists. I remembered that in COTM9 I researched philosophy on the same turn with Americans. I was not sure that I will be as lucky this time.
Nevertheless, we got philosophy before anyone else at 1275BC and become Republic on 1225BC. Emphasizing research was probably not a bad idea, since many people in this spoiler reported republic slingshot failure.
Unlike in most of my games I decided to continue research. I still do not see any *beep* and therefore maybe it is better to produce *beep* than *beep*.
So I continued researching.
At 1000BC my world looked like this.

Construction 925BC.

In 875BC we refused to give construction to Dutch and they declared. The same year we met Japan.

750BC FP

710BC Currency and Monotheism. The earliest MA I ever had.

This is my world at this moment:

I still confused about how to proceed in this game. I probably will research towards *beep*. If I will see *beep*, I will start researching *beep*.

When I was entering MA, I've seen something strange:

I am not sure why my advizer tells me that "we learned the secretes of polytheism from Celts". We indeed traded it from Celts, but it was in 1275BC, not in 730BC.

 

[Kaiser_Berger]

I decided also to go for a 20k win in this one. I settleed one southeast and built the following culture in Seoul for the AA.

3100BC- Temple.
1870BC- Colossus
670BC-Pyramids
570BC- Library
10BC- Great Library, Start GA.

Interesting to see many snagging both Oracle and SoZ. I didn't really have a good chance at either. I could have probably built Oracle, but it was between that or Pyramids. Pyramids is obviously the superior choice. It'll be interesting to see how it all pans out.

I did manage to just barely pull off the Philo gambit, getting Republic for free. Not sure on the date, but it was probably slightly before 500BC in range.

 

[ionimplant]

Interesting to see many snagging both Oracle and SoZ. I didn't really have a good chance at either. I could have probably built Oracle, but it was between that or Pyramids. Pyramids is obviously the superior choice. It'll be interesting to see how it all pans out.

well, in terms of culture per term, both oracle and SoZ are better than pyramids.

I did manage to just barely pull off the Philo gambit, getting Republic for free. Not sure on the date, but it was probably slightly before 500BC in range.

wow... 500BC is a late date. good that AI in your game didn't get philosophy.
i do think AI need serious improvement since in my game Dutch got mapmaking instead of philosophy. it's such a stupid act.

 

[leopalas]

How does one get a golden Age with this UU?? Does it actually kill enemy units?? One must have a bunch of them then, considering the odds of it taking a single hit point Any feedback on this?

 

[davidcrazy]

How does one get a golden Age with this UU?? Does it actually kill enemy units?? One must have a bunch of them then, considering the odds of it taking a single hit point Any feedback on this?

you can always redline an enemy unit by some other regular units (have you seen a tank lose to a spearman while reducing the spearman to 1hp? )
personally i never used them and didn't build it in my game.

 

[leopalas]

That is the question. I can do that. But it its very difficult to time those events. It probably makes this the worst UU. In all other Civs u can rely on the UU to trigger the GA when you want.

 

[ionimplant]

That is the question. I can do that. But it its very difficult to time those events. It probably makes this the worst UU. In all other Civs u can rely on the UU to trigger the GA when you want.

well, to use those units effectively, you always need a couple of them instead only a few of them and hope they can hit. thinking this way, timing those events shouldn't be hard. especially when you're laying a seige to a city, you can keep bombarding it until you achieve what you want (the enemy units won't run away in a city).

 

[Kaiser_Berger]

well, in terms of culture per term, both oracle and SoZ are better than pyramids.

I concur 100%. The problem was that I hardly expanded fast enough to claim ivory before Carthage. Given the the choice, I would certainly take those two over just the Pyramids. Not that I regret getting the Pyramids that early on. Aside from planning for Seoul, the game was on autopilot from that point forward.

 

[predesad]

open class

I think I have done horrible in this "easy regent game"

first of all, I settled in the entirely wrong place for good reasons, i wanted to move my capitol inland some and was counting on using those BG by the lake for a second city, but this was before I saw the lake was completely surrounded by mountains except for those couple BG. Anyway, here goes:

4000 worker N see the lake (terrain value of 2 food tells me its a lake) realize i can have a 4 turn settler factory by chopping that forest, and then irrigating to cow, but it will take a lot of work and will require irrigating then mining over some irrigation, perhaps I was just greedy and should have instead irrigated the deer after that chop, settler NE to hills to see if i spot anything interesting from that vantage point

3950 settler n to hills, worker NW to forest

3900 seoul founded, build spear (forest chop will complete in 5 turns, building curragh would waste 3 shields) research pottery

3850 - 3750 zzzz

3700 worker irrigate, seoul -> spear -> curragh, spear sent to explore

3500 worker road

3400 build curragh -> curragh, curragh sent to explore to the north

3350 worker to BG to irrigate and bring irrigation to cow

3250 build curragh - > worker, curragh to explore to south

3150 discovery pottery, research writing at max; worker built -> granary

2800 curragh spots orange borders, but contact is delayed because of no units or cities on the coast

2710 contact vikings

2650 contact carthage, sell pottery to both vikings and carthage for 10 G each so I can support deficit research, they would not trade any techs for it

2510 build settler -> warrior

2390 build warrior -> settler, Pyong founded, builds warrior

2310 spear pops barbs near carthage, survives attacks but does not promote, one barb heads toward carthage, unfrtunately I did not get to witness the result of the barb invasion on carthage

2270 build settler -> settler

2230 contact Mongols; trade mongols ALPH for IW + 35 G, trade carthage IW + 4G for MAS + WC, trade Mongols MAS for CB, trade carthage CB for 4G (Mongols are still up MYST)

2190 Pyong builds warrior -> warrior

2150 Wonsan founded, build warrior

2110 Seoul settler -> settler

2030 contact Celts, trade Celts IW for MYST, Wheel, + 35 G, Pyong build warrior -> worker

1990 Wonsan builds warrior -> worker

1950 Seoul settler -> settler

1830 Pyong worker -> warrior

1790 Seoul settler -> settler

1750 discover writing, research COL (20 turns @ max)

1725 Pusan founded -> warrior

1700 Pyong -> warrior -> curragh

1675 Namp'o founded, Seoul settler -> settler

1650 Chojin founded by ivory (this was either the 3rd or 4th settler built, took a long journey to the ivory to keep carthage from getting it) builds warrior; Wonsan worker -> warrior

1625 contact Japan, sell MAS for 10 G, still trying to support deficit research

1600 Pyong curragh -> curragh (am not at liberty to say why i built all these curraghs to avoid spoiling

1575 Seoul settler -> settler, N'ampo warrior -> worker

1550 Wonsan & Pusan both build warriors -> warriors for both

1525 Hyangsna founded, builds worker, this is the chosen site for jumping my palace since it is most central, palace jump will wait until I fill up my area with cities and start war production, i decided carthage must be eliminated

1500 Seoul settler -> settler ( a worker chop gets settler one turn early)

1475 Pyong curragh -> settler

1450 contact Dutch, writing is known by Mongols, Celts, Carthage, Dutch; Japan has Poly; Dutch, VIkings, MOngols have Horseback; gift Alph to Japan, trade Dutch MAS for HBR + 35 G, Japan wopnt give Ply for HBR, writing, IW + 119 G; wonsan warrior -> worker, nampo worker -> warrior

1425 Visan founded (really cant read my writing so that might not be the right name), Chojun warrior -> worker

1400 Seoul settler -> settler, Pusan wariror -> worker

1375 COL discovered PHIL will be 7 turns at MAX continuing deficit research

1325 Inch'on founded builds curragh, Nampo wariror -> worker

1300 Seoul settler -> settler, Pyong settler -> granary, Wonsan worker -> worker, Hyangsan worker -> worker

1275 Pyongsong founded -> spear, trade MYST, IW to Dutch for MM, Pusan worker -> spear

1250 contact India, trade India MM for Math + 48 G, changed production in both Pusan & Pyongsong from sear to cats ** Because of aforementioned need to eliminate Carthage I need some artillery, I am not planning to go up against the Numidians without cats & hopefully trebs before war starts, I have no iron yet so I am not ready to build swords, getting iron hooked up has been a low priority, getting irrigation to parts of my empire has occupied most of my workers time and has drastically affectd city placement so that I could irrigate through hills

1225 Wonsan worker -> cat

1200 confrim, oops cannot say that, anyway got some nic infromation here that will be useful in the future; discover PHIL, claim REP for free, do not revolt because I am going with Monarchy later due to unit support and lack of rivers to help commerce and fresh water to grow cities above size 6, the extra cats I am going to need against Carthage will drive up unit support, research currency, Seoul settler-> settler, Nampo worker -> cat, Some city name I cant read builds worker -> cat

1175 gift writing to Japan, trade Japan MM, PHIL, & Math for Poly, Chojun worker - cat

1150 Trajon founded builds worker

1125 Paegan founded builds worker

1100 Seoul settler -> settler

1075 change prod in Hyang to cat + worker chop, Nampo cat -> cat, Hyang cat -> cat (in order to avoid confusion here, I changed production in Hyang from worker to cat at the end of the 1075 turn, my worker would have finished during that inter turn, but so did the forest chop so it was during this inter turn that Hyang built the cat but I always attribute builds to the previous turn)

1050 Wonsan cat -> galley, Pusan cat -> galley, Pyongsong cat -> barracks

1025 Monplo (or a city similar to that in name) founded

1000 ivory connected, finally

QSC stats: 13 cities, 21 pop, 1 settler (+ 1 due in 1 turn) 12 workers (+ 3 in production) 14 warirors, 1 spear, 5 cats, 4 curraghs, 1 granary; resources: ivory; techs: all AA except Lit, Mon, Constr, & Currency (due in 10), 163 gold + 0 GPT

basically I got my iron hooked up and the incense too, filled my peninsula with cities and entered the MA @ 600 BC claiming ENG as my free tech and I started researching Feud. My plan is to go for a domination win by researching straight down to H'wachas. A couple turns after entering the MA I traded for Monarchy in a bad decison I cannot fully explain I remained a despotism for several more turns.

unfortunately I have lost my pic, I will post one later from 1000 BC if I have no saves closer to the end of the MA

 

[gskyes]

This is my first GOTM in a long time, but this game got me back into it.

Here is a summary of my QSC timeline.
4000BC. I moved the worker N, then moved the settler SE.
3950BC. Seoul founded. Research pottery 100%.
Seoul would build 2 warriors and a curragh, then a settler.
3350BC. Pottery Researched.
3000BC. P'yongyang founded on the forrest N of the forrest with the game.
2670BC. Carthage contacted.
2430BC. Scandanavia contacted. Trade for warrior code.
2390BC. The Wheel researched.
2350BC. Celts and Netherlands contacted. Trade for ceremonial burial and masonry.
2150BC. Seoul is now a 4-turn settler factory.
2030BC. Wonsan founded.
1725BC. Pusan founded. Iron Working researched. Contaced India. Trade for Mysticism.
1625BC. Namp'o founded. Mongols contacted.
1450BC. Cheju founded.
1425BC. Japan contacted.
1400BC. Writing researched.
1375BC. Hyangsan founded.
1325BC. Trade for Horseback Riding.
1300BC. Ulsan founded.
1275BC. Inch'on founded. Embassies with Carhtage, Scandanavia, and Netherlands.
1200BC. Philosophy researched. Map Making is free tech.
1150BC. Pyongsong founded.
1075BC. Taejon founded.
1025BC. Paegam founded.
1000BC. Trade for Mathematics and Polytheism. Build embassy with India.

12 cities, 22 citizens, 2 settlers, 8 workers, 7 warriors, 4 spearmen, 4 curragh, 1 granary, 2 barracks.
I have all AA techs except construction, currency, code of laws, literature, republic and monarcy. All civs have been met.

Here is a picture of my land at 1000BC.

thoughts:
I am glad that I recently learned and practiced how to make 4 turn settler factories. They are very powerful. I like it even better when I don't have to watch it. My factory in this game ran itself- I didn't have to touch it.
Bonus grass w/ cow is nice...
The forrest w/ game, when chopped, the shields went to P'yongyang, even though a citizen in Seoul was working on it. It would have been nice to have those shields go toward the granary. I should take a look at Cracker's article again.
Those Carthage units in the north of my territory are a warrior and settler. I didn't have enough units to block them, and they eventually founded a town on the coast north of Hyangsan.

Other notes in Ancient age.
Mongols "sneak" attacked me by landing a warrior next to undefended P'yongyang. I scrambled a warrior from Seoul to defend, but the Mongol warrior won. No bother... next turn it flipped back to me. Then I bought India and Japan to fight them.
The war with Carthage hadn't started until the Middle ages, although I had started building an attack force by the end of the AA.
I didn't get the Statue of Zues. Netherlands beat me to it by 1 turn. I got the Great Lighthouse instead.

 

[Redbad]

Open, going for 20K

After Sabre, ionimplant and denyd I'm the fourth in the 20K struggle
edit: oops, forgot Kaiser_Berger, so I'm the fifth posting on 20K

Preparations

After been beaten twice for 20K, by 25 turns in COTM9 and by at least 42 turns in COTM10, it's time to get serious. I copied the starting situation and did some testruns up to 1000BC. The purpose of these runs is to see what can be build and researched in that timeframe. And when Karasu stated that the cow sits on a bonusgrass, I could redo my testruns. Results of these tests were, amongst others, settle 1 SE, use the capitol for 20K, let the workers always road before mine and don't chop the forest next to Seoul. Because I want CB and Mysticism first I consider the Republic slingshot to be to risky, so I'll go for a free Literature.

Some of the mistakes I made in the past were to neglect research speed and building low-culture wonders. So throughout the game all research will be max and the empire will have libraries as a priority. As for the culture building I defined 1 culturepoint for 100 shields as culture-index 1. As long as there is a choice in culture-building I will not build culture under c-i 1.

This game will be about fast 20K without consideration for Jason-scoring.

(I have noted only a few dates in the write-up. There is a time calender at the bottom where I've listed the 20K city builds.)


Ancient Ages

As stated above I settled 1 SE. Research orders: <Ceremonial Burial> <Mysticism> <Writing> <Philosophy> <Code of Law> <Republic>. Building orders for Seoul: temple, worker, Colossus, settler, Oracle, library and Great Library. According to this plan the Golden Age will start when we're in Republic and the G-Lib will give us all the first and second tier AA-techs and probably some third tier techs too. I launched a settler very late in order to maintain a higher population in Seoul early on and thus building faster. I made an exception for a worker to prevent having Seoul working unimproved tiles and thus have a faster research-rate. 3 Turns after building the settler, I joined a worker to Seoul to save 2 turns on the Oracle.
The downside of having the first settler out in 1950BC is a small empire. I also missed out on the ivory and the incense which were settled by Carthage. I managed to get the iron, which was quite a relieve with the strong Carthagians next door. When all space was settled I had build 13 towns. I had send 1 warrior and 1 curragh out to explore. The warrior met the Carthagians, the curragh the rest but the Celts. Contact with the Celts would come in the Middle Ages through trade.

On the 20K-front everything went smoothly and the building orders up until the G-Lib were executed. The Golden Age started and G-Lib provided all AA-techs except Currency. I prioritised the aquaduct next. Irrigating the deer enabled 11-pop which produced (if irrc) 36 shields (in GA) per turn. The other wonders with c-i 1 or higher (Pyramids, Mausoleum of Mausollos and Hanging Gardens) could not be build. They all ended up in the cascade, even the Temple of Artemis. I had no interest in the Great Wall or the Great Lighthouse so it’s time to look at the MA.


20K-EVENTS

3950- palace
3200- temple
2070- Colossus
1225- Oracle
1175- library
590- ----------------- Republic (after 3 turn anarchy)
370- Great Library (start Golden Age)
310- aquaduct
270- ----------------- Middle Ages

 

[Più Freddo]

The forrest w/ game, when chopped, the shields went to P'yongyang, even though a citizen in Seoul was working on it. It would have been nice to have those shields go toward the granary. I should take a look at Cracker's article again.

It's not in Cracker's article, it's in this article by T-hawk, and a correct picture is in this article by planetfall.

 

[Balton]

20K attempt 1.22 Conquests version

since I had dropped to 2xx in the Global rankings and because of a curragh and a scout I chose conquest version to see if it would have a benifit in AA.

YES it did. I got POTTERY and LIT from the Scout along with some gold before he was lost to Barbs on his last attempt on a goody hut.

My initial research was at max for CB then the Rebuplic slingshot (got it). I timed my GA with MoM and built GL during my GA. But before I was able to build a Temple, the Colossus, Pyramids, SoZ and a library(thanks to Scout). I cannot remember the exact dates as I am at work right now but all in the AA. I lost Hanging Gardens to the ToA cascade and had to settle for Great Lighthouse.

My big mistake was in not expanding very quickly and I became a "bully-boy" for a while as I gave in to demands early on, untill I got the iron hooked up. Then it is a different story but have to wait for the next spoiler as I am in IA currently.

 

[Gyathaar]

When I was entering MA, I've seen something strange:

I am not sure why my advizer tells me that "we learned the secretes of polytheism from Celts". We indeed traded it from Celts, but it was in 1275BC, not in 730BC.

You get these weird messages in the following case:
- you are a scientific civ,
- when you enter a new age you select a tech to research before you get your free tech
- you get the tech you selected as free tech

(In this case it looks like you selected and got monotheism)

 

[Zorn]

I just screwed it up royally.
I settled so slow that it hurt myself. I even managed to be behind tech, with a scientific civ on regent.
I think the game is still winable, but I am just so disgusted with my performance, that I can`t get myself to keep on playing.
What a great debut in COTM.

 

[Denniz]

did you do full-out research? with only 2 cities, i managed to get philosophy at free republic at 1000BC, before which i deviated to get CB and mysticism.

As much as possible. I use Lux for happiness during the early going. Expansion results in a lot of low pop cities. My move of palace meant a lot of my ciites were more corrupt than usual, with the resulting low commerce.

Still, I got Philosophy in 950BC, which would have gotten me repubilc only the AI got there first. I had 7 cities by then. If I hadn't moved my palace, I probably would have had at least 10.

I think it is was mainly bad RNG luck with the one AI pop writing and another Philosophy. I know I didn't trade writing until one of them knew it this time. I probably shouldn't have, as I helped spread it around.

@ionimplant, if you only had 2 ciites at 1000bc and you weren't going for 20K, you need to kick your expansion into high gear. Maybe, even with a 20K. For this start, I was on the low side with only 7.

 

[namliaM]

I am totaly new to this forum (and its GOTM) But when i load the save file i get a Curragh and a Scout extra? I was hoping to match my civ "skills" vs the posts here but... no cur and no scout

Do i have some issues with my version?

Regards

** Never mind Just saw what went wrong on the GOTM site

 

[ionimplant]

Some of the mistakes I made in the past were to neglect research speed and building low-culture wonders. So throughout the game all research will be max and the empire will have libraries as a priority. As for the culture building I defined 1 culturepoint for 100 shields as culture-index 1. As long as there is a choice in culture-building I will not build culture under c-i 1.

i made a big mistake in the past GOTM persia in building Great library earlier than library when literature became available. that would save 4 turns for the final date. but for this game i again made this mistake (well, i realized that's a mistake only after read some of Tao's comments yesterday). but for this game, i actually already have a Great library prebuild going on when literature becomes available.... it's really a dilemma for me.

The downside of having the first settler out in 1950BC is a small empire. I also missed out on the ivory and the incense which were settled by Carthage.

i doubt it can be smaller than mine. good thing is i did get ivory.

20K-EVENTS
3950- palace
3200- temple
2070- Colossus
1225- Oracle
1175- library
590- ----------------- Republic (after 3 turn anarchy)
370- Great Library (start Golden Age)
310- aquaduct
270- ----------------- Middle Ages

Oh, i think again i'm going to lose due to my late library which was not built until 130 BC...

 

[budweiser]

EDIT: Predator

I just have a few points.
I settled SE.
I missed the philosophy slingshot.
I actually backfilled my towns to get the resource and the luxuries first (I can say that, right?).
I had to attack the Vikings, carthage, and netherlands with warriors and a bowman to keep their warrior/settlers out of my lands. It worked and I knocked out their settlements.
I miss clicked at one point and pillaged a road that connected one of my luxuries. I had no workers any where for miles, so I reloaded.
I used curraghs, but not too early. I think they should have been one of the first things I built, like some of the other players did.
I had a 5 turn revolt to republic and I got engineering for free (yuck I wanted feudalism).
I had no plan on how to win, but I sure didnt feel like fighting in this one.