COTM102 Maya - Spoiler: Game submitted or abandoned

[mad-bax]

COTM102 Maya - Spoiler: game submitted or abandoned.

I can only apologise for the lateness of this spoiler. Real Life (Work) has got in the way in a big way I'm afraid. There are others amongst the staff who are also having similar issues. Please bear with us. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible. edit: still using the Christmas smileys??

So, no mid game spoiler for this game, so please; only post or read further down than this post if you have submitted or abandoned your game.

I thought this was quite a big game when I was play-testing it.

 

[vincentf]

Veni, vidi, vici, priti isi...

Game: C3C COTM 102
Date submitted: 2014-01-31
Reference number: 30547
Your name: vincentf
Software Version: C3C 1.22 for Windows
Entry class: Open
Game status: Domination Victory for Maya
Game date: 1370 AD
Firaxis score: 5380
Jason score: 8814
Time played: 10:17:15
Submitted save: FIN Smoke-Jaguar of the Maya, 1370 AD.SAV
Renamed file: vincentf_COTM102_C3C122_01.SAV

 

[greatbeyond]

The Maya finally get to Alpha Centauri...

Space win in 1940AD

The raging barbs appeared to be a non-factor in this game. At least I didn't have any significant issues with them. The damage was done by two solitary Barb horsemen who came out of the fog in between sentry patrols to kill two Settlers in my own territory.

I settled in place and started with a few warriors in a row to help explore and keep the barbs at bay. Then I built a Settler and then a Granary. I researched Archery for the JT and then a DOW America which was slow in expanding. There was a distinct lack of bonuses and good spots to settle.

I eliminated America then went to eliminate the Aztecs. While taking two cities from China for good measure, however one flipped shortly later. I lost two former American cities to the Inca on a culture flip. I raced to Chivalry and used knights to finish the conquest of my own land mass, then Cavalry to eliminate the Inca. At this point a conquest or domination was way to far down the road and culture would be to difficult to pull off, so off to space it was.

What really slowed me down besides the culture flips was early in the Aztec war, I took one of his cities and settled another in the gap. My stack moved on to take a third when the RNG decided to wipe out my stack with virtually no losses to the Aztecs who then took both cities. rebuilding without bothering to make peace I eventually took them back and suffered no further setbacks with them but the damage was done.

I did have several fake wars, always having one AI or another declare on me, but they never amounted to much and I used my tech lead to purchase allies.

Techs were Archery, Alpha, Writing, CoL, Philo, Republic. I was surprised to get the slingshot. At the end game I was at the end of the Modern Age tech tree and the AIs hadn't quite got there.

 

[templar_x]

i made it in time!

and moreover, i wanted a bc victory, and barely i made that also!

therefore...

conquest victory in 10bc
Jason starts with 12...

i hardly had any time to Play, and even less to take notes. i am really glad that once again i am able to submit for a XOTM game. it feels like Ages since the last game.

i know i expanded only until a certain Point. there was no other Food ressource, so i simply stopped REX quite early and prepared for an early Republic GA. with these troops, i started wars against America and China, Setting up multiple supply routes to conquer each continent simoultanously. Korea and Inca came next. then the rest, sending ships ahead to Transport troops as good as possible to where they were needed. Aztecs, Rome, Japan were the last ones to go, with Ragnar dieing only shortly before. i managed to sink settlers on boats or kill them soon after landing.

i got 3 MGLs, all transformed into armies, the last one only by the very end but still helpful. everything seemed to work out smoothly towards the finish. that was necessary also, as it did not seem too easy to get this one done in the bc years...

thanks for an interesting game, and for allowing us for some more time! (without that i would surely have given up...)

i stopped Research very early, practically after MM, as i was convinced the fastest way to conquer this game was with horses. mainly for their use in armies i also built a few swords, and very few Special archers. the only improvements i built were the FP, 2 grans and quite a few raxes. and i believe 3 harbours for lux connection.

the one thing i was missing, but neither wanted to hand-build or wait for the AS to finish it, was the Great Lighthouse. but i went kinda ok without it.

towards the end i tend to sell everything and only optimize cash, so that i may be able to rush one more troop on the front. few turns before the prognosed conquest i also disband towns with a flip risk, so to minimize risks here also. of course it looks pitiful to see how all your once big producing cities and your empire are cut down like this, but it does make a difference. and newly produced troops won´t make it to any front any more anyways.

t_x

 

[greatbeyond]

amazing win templar_x, your boldness paid off!

 

[Lanzelot]

conquest victory in 10bc
Jason starts with 12...

Looks like we played the same strategy...

 

[templar_x]

so, have you been more or less successful than my horse conquest? there is no other spoiler waiting for that piece of info...
t_x

 

[Lanzelot]

As you said:

Spoiler :

conquest victory in 10bc
Jason starts with 12...
(and it does not have 4 digits...)

During the game it felt like it was going quite well, but also that it could have gone better:
- lost time with unnecessary flips (one turn before I took the last Incan town, another one at the other end of their continent flipped , and I had to send 4 horses all the way back)
- had some SOURs (tricky's acronym: String Of Unlucky Rolls... ) E.g. when attacking the Korean capital (always forget its name...) with 10 units, I lost like 7 of them and took down only one defender (and promoted the rest of them to elite... .
- had only one MGL and quite late

But all in all it looks like our games were very similar, that's why I didn't post more details. Like you I stopped REX after basically the first ring, stopped research after the Republic slingshot, started an early GA, build barracks and horses, did extensive ship-chaining (again) and rushed galleys in conquered coastal towns, when it was time to think about hopping over to the next continent. Ah, yes, and some harbors for lux connections. That's all I did in this game.

So in short: basically a "twin" to your game. Very interesting that despite the seemingly big luck factor of battle outcomes, MGLs etc, we finished the game in exactly the same turn!! We even had the same trouble finishing within the original deadline: first I had started playing GOTM131 a bit, but after a while I figured I wouldn't have time for a spaceship game anyway and I realized I had already misplayed GOTM131 a bit (moved settler into the wrong direction...) and wouldn't have a chance for a decent finish anyway. So I abandoned GOTM131 and started this one instead. This one went quite well, so I wanted to submit it. And when I realized, I wouldn't make it in time, I came here to request some extra time, only to find that you had already done so a few hours before...

When I look at your screenshot, there's only one difference: your core looks quite small, while I pushed a handful of core cities to size 12. In the beginning I wanted to play this game without any infrastructure (except for barracks of course), but then during GA I could not resist building the FP and like 3-4 markets in my biggest cities. And when a 50-turn min-run on Construction completed, I built an aqueduct in the FP-city to push it to size 11. But it looks like it didn't make a big difference: the extra gold was just enough to compensate for the lost shields more or less, and we still had the same result. Could be, though, that the extra happiness and the bigger cities gave me a few more points in the end?! We'll find out. In any case, this is going to be an interesting duell again I hope that Neo, drazek, tricky and Piu Freddo will find time to submit as well and can't wait to see their results.

 

[templar_x]

absolutely awesome!!!!

quite surely, you will have more Points. i did not care much about City size, and even though i do not remember the exact number right now, i believe it was rather low above 12000.

i also had 2 SOURs, one right away in the first war against America, and another one against one single Korean spear to fend off 7 horses. (do not want to imagine what would have happened if they had been tanks!!!)

my core towns could not even have grown any bigger, because of the ultra-dense set-up of the first ring.
what i really did not do, and maybe would have been the only thing to buy me another turn or two, was detailplanning any ship-chains. i simply lacked the time and nerve for that.

t_x

 

[supersova_SU]

Domination 770 AD
Firaxis score: 7001
Jason score: 10619

Lanzelot
templar_x

Fantastic results ...

 

[Lanzelot]

In fact I think that on this map Conquest was a bit easier than Domination: there is quite a lot of land, and on Monarch the AI cannot settle all that land quickly enough. (And the human player of course cannot do so either.) So there are simply not enough towns on the map for an early Domination.

(This is also seen by the fact that in this game I had somewhere between 30 - 40% territory at the end of the game. (Can't remember exactly.) In a "normal" Conquest game I usually have way over 50% territory by the end of the game.)

 

[ignas]

Domination victory in 210 AD
Jason score: x2x31

This was a very satisfying game despite the fact that a planned quick small domination game became a 20 hour playing time parasite. Game plan was very similar to Lanzelot's and Templar's.

Built a granary in the capital and produced 4 turn settlers/2 turn workers in Despotism, other towns emphasized on warriors/curraghs.
Research was set to Republic and stopped immeadiately after it was learned for good.

In Republic built few barracks and then produced warriors/chariots, which were later upgraded to swords/horses with the cash, that was saved at 100% tax.
Didn't build any infrastructure, most of the shields were spent on horses, settlers and galleys.

The conquest started around 800 BC, attacking simultaneously America and China. After that, expeditionary forces were divided into 3 parts: to conquer Inca, Aztecs and Korea. Which was a mistake, should have left Inca for later and focused on other 2.

Around that time a large island was found and settlers were ordered to fill it asap. In 30 AD a territory was at 43%. Gained 25 % of world in 9 turns and finished in 210 AD.

This COTM attracted 20 submissions, what is probably a good sign.

 

[Kuningas]

Wow Nice set of 12xxx Jason score victories. I reached 12xxx score too with 100k culture victory in 1395AD. Though I only need 80k culture points as it was small map. 100k was needed I was a bit angry.

 

[mad-bax]

Though I only need 80k culture points as it was small map. 100k was needed I was a bit angry.

Are you reporting this as a bug?

 

[ignas]

I noticed the same when playing a China COTM game on a small map many months ago: map was small, but you needed to gather 100 K instead of 80 K culture (which you need to win a cultural victory on a small map on Conquests).