COTM50 - Final Spoiler

[civ_steve]

COTM 50 Final Spoiler; Game Submitted

Reading Requirements:
You may only read this thread if:

1. You have completed and submitted your game.

Posting Restrictions:

1. None! As long as its related to the GOTM, and within the forum rules!
2. And ... Absolutely NO discussion of any other active 'X'OTM contest!

I suspect many players will go for an earlier conquest or domination. Feel free to tell all in this spoiler, or if you went for a more peaceful victory, how did that go?

 

[Yilar]

First to submit, first to post final spoiler...

This was an increditable easy game, that I used less than a day on .

Open Class (the difference between the predator class and the open class is just to unsignaficant).

Game status: Domination Victory for Zululand
Game date: 580 AD
Firaxis score: 5499
Jason score: 10432
Time played: 04:38:24

After getting the republic sling-shot and a tech lead into MA, I researched chiv, built a few knights and killed off ottomans, mongolia and some of sumer. At this point my knights werent winning every battle so I upgraded them to cavs, and then the real killing started. I was taking on average 4 cities a turn. Byz and japan was dead in a just a few turns and the same goes for Hitties and India. I ended up with 5 armies and about 100 cavs at the end.

All in all I wish the game would have been more differculty. How about no rivers and no bonus for pred class, instead of just losing a worthless tech and having the enemy get better unit support and a free musket or some crap.

 

[MarleysGh0st]

Entry class: Open
Game status: Domination Victory for Zululand
Game date: 1710 AD
Firaxis score: 3026
Jason score: 5806
Time played: 29:26:18

So, I had been at peace entering the Industrial Age and I was thinking of going to war against the Mongols next, with domination as my goal. The lack of resources on the continent was a huge advantage for me, since everyone else seemed to be lacking iron, horses, saltpeter, coal, or all of the above.

Then in 1130, the Hittites demand saltpeter from me and declare war when I refuse. Okay, they're as good a target as any! A few bribes bring the Sumerians, Indians and Byzantines into an alliance with me. Scandinavia and Egypt join alliances against the Indians, who suffer a bit. I add the Arabs to my alliance, just to keep thinks nicely unbalanced. I destroy the Hittites in 1355.

The wars have left my garrisons stretched very thin. After just a few years of peace, Egypt declares war on me in 1385, capturing one border town. I bring the Arabs and Byzantines into another alliance and commence conquering Egypt.

With this war still in progress, Japan does a ROP rape in 1430, capturing one of my undefended towns--with a warrior, no less! I take that back, get the Sumerians to ally against Japan, and go on with a two-front war. Sumeria brings the Mongols into the alliance against Japan.

For a fine gesture of futility, Egypt, now down to two cities, allies with Sumeria against Japan in 1465. This does nothing to stop the conquest of Egypt in 1470.

With Japan on the brink of extinction in 1535, it's the Mongol's turn to ROP rape, razing another of my undefended cities! I destroy the Japanese on the next turn and send my forces east. And I bring Sumeria, Byzantium and India into another alliance. The Mongols are gone by 1600 and I'm slightly upset that the Byzantines have one of their cities; so far, I'd done a pretty good job of keeping most of the spoils in all of these wars for myself.

A few more turns go by, and--remarkably--nobody else declares war against me, not even when I refuse a Sumerian demand for iron. So, having completed the Intelligence Agency, I try to plant a spy in Scandinavia in 1660. The Vikings catch that spy and declare war. Once more, it's time to build an alliance with Sumeria, Byzantium, Arabia and India. Scandinavia is conquered in 1690.

I try the same trick against the Byzantines in 1705, but this time the spy is successful. Darn it! So I have to declare war, myself. I conquer them in one turn and the Domination victory follows in the next.

This was an amusing game, particularly with how, after my first invasion of the continent, I didn't need to be the aggressor in my next four wars of conquest. However, I see that I ended this game in exactly the same year as in GOTM 80. And seeing how some of you are achieving the same result a millenium before I do...I guess I'm in a rut!

 

[krakedhalo]

Entry class: Open
Game status: Diplomatic Victory for Zululand
Game date: 1585 AD
Firaxis score: 2325
Jason score: 5676
Time played: 12:46:12

Our peace-loving Zulu succeed in winning the respect and admiration of all nations! After entering a Middle period in our history in 460bc, our sages were able to report the discovery of a new technology every at every fifth or sixth meeting of our Senate. We shared all we knew with all the nations of the world, but only rarely did those nations discover something we ourselves did not already know. We built two great monuments to science, and in 1330 our scientists described a theory of evolution that has something to do with monkeys and immediately led to breakthroughs in atomic theory and electronics.

Careful distribution of our knowledge allowed us to maintain a balance in the order of nations, such that none became too strong at the expense of the others. The Mongol nation attempted a hostile takeover of the hapless Japanese, but overstepped their bounds and declared themselves rightful rulers of the Zulu homeland! Their invaders were forced to surrender, and we decided to send some traditional Impi war dancers to Mongolia to show the Mongol people that conflicts can be settled without violence by having a costume contest. Alas, the Mongols had only violence in their hearts, and our war dancers were attacked. They had cleverly taken refuge in the mountains of Mongolia, and were able to rebuff their attackers! Though they did eventually lose their lives, their victory and eventual sacrifice inspired an age of Zulu pride and hard work that lasted from 1495 through the end of the competitive age.

In the glorious year of 1580, the Zulu were inspired by a spirit of brotherhood to give every nation any technology known to any nation, that we may enter this new modern age together, as friends. The following year, Shaka, our leader, convened the leaders of all nations together and proposed that we unite in common government, for the betterment of all. Shaka was nominated as leader, and Gilgamesh of Sumeria proposed he also run, so the election would represent a true choice between options and not a sham. Shaka, beloved of the world, received 10 votes. All nations had prospered with him guiding them from afar, and all survived to cheer him on!

 

[Spoonwood]

After I finished the game I read this again "This month we revisit the Zulus! A 60% ocean, Pangaea and 10 Regent level AI should give you plenty of targets and lands to go after!" I had a good laugh from that.

So, in 1060 I entered the industrial ages. I started on Steam Power (or at least set research to Steam Power) and sold away Magnetism for some gpt to some tribes. Sumeria ended up with Steam Power as their free tech... I could buy it, so I decided I may as well gift The Byzantines on up too. They drew Steam Power also. I then gifted/traded The Ottomans up and they drew Nationalism. So, I traded Democracy, Navigation, Economics, and Military Tradition to Theodora for Steam Power. I then researched Industralization.

After Industralization I went for Medicine. Since I had a nice pre-build going a turn or so later one of my towns got a factory, which then started on Universal Suffrage. In 1255 my gpt deals expired, so I traded around Medicine getting gpt, coal, and nationalism. I started railroading and upgraded my impis to rifleman. After Medicine I researched Sanitation and then Electricity. By 1305 some AIs had Fascism, and by 1315 some AIs had Ironclads. I finished off Universal Suffrage in 1340. In 1345 I started irrigating tiles, and in 1350 we went multi-national... we had foreign inhabitants walking our streets... not just working out in the fields.

In 1355 India and The Ottomans had The Corporation, which I promptly acquired and then made sure everyone else got it that same turn. I learned Electricity in 1360 and then researched The Scientific Method. Espionage showed up in the AIs techs in 1360, and I bought it from Gandhi for something like 1006 gold. In 1385 I had a city at size 30. In 1395 I learned The Scientific Method, and swapped my pre-build from The Intelligence Agency to The Scientific Method. In 1435 3 AIs had Steel... and none of them had Refining. I haven't seen that one before. I purchased Steel for a measley 10 gold and shut research off for a bit (as TOE would soon finish).

In 1450 4 AIs had Refining, and I bought it from The Mongols for some 2890 gold. Then I decided to turn around and sell it. I also acquired Communism from The Vikings here, but once I remembered I had Espionage I realized that as silly. In 1460 some 6 tribes had Replaceable Parts. I bought it from The Mongols for some 2250 gold. No one had extra rubber... at least... not yet. In 1470 I decided I'd better acquire The Ottomans oil. So, I rang Osman up and get this... I got his extra oil for my World Map (how did that happen???).

I didn't have any cities on a river, so I thought I wouldn't have the opportunity to build Hoover's Dam myself. Of course, I did have a river in a city's radius, so I found out later I did have that option. Anyways... since I thought I couldn't build Hoover's Dam, I decided to take Atomic Theory and Combustion as my free techs to try and keep the AIs away from Electronics as long as possible. I didn't want Hoover's Dam to cascade into anything. After TOE completed I researched Mass Production.

Arabia demanded Nationalism in 1495 and I gave it to them. A silly war seemed unnecessary and I didn't fear them catching up or pushing the tech pace ahead faster. In 1530 Gandhi demanded Combustion. I declined to give it to him and he went away. Once I finished Mass Production I used "what's the big picture" to swap my pre-build to a commercial dock. I researched Motorized Transportation next. The AI's attitude had seemed to slip around here, probably becuase I decided to stop selling tech like I did before. I checked MapStat and no one had Combustion yet, so I decided to sell it. I also gifted Japan and Egypt 100 gold, and their attitudes went back up to Polite. Japan felt Annoyed and Egypt felt Cautious before this.

In 1540 The Ottomans, Japan, and Egypt had Atomic Theory. The Arabs got exterminated in 1560. In 1575 I learned Motorized Transportation and started research Electronics. In 1585 The Egyptians started Hoover's Dam, so I purchased Electronics for 2730 gold. Then I started researching Flight. In 1600, after finishing the training of a guerrila, I notice I can build Hoover's Dam and a hydro plant. So, I cash-rushed a worker and then finished off the real cash-rush with a hydro plant. I also noticed this turn I could get extra rubber from Gandhi, so I did so and upgraded my rifles to infantries.

In 1605 I started on Hoover's Dam, as what I hoped would become a pre-build... and it did do so, as in 1620 Egypt and The Ottomans had Flight. I purchased it from The Egyptians and entered the modern era. I started researching Fission, which I had due in 20 turns. I started mining some tiles, and then had to re-irrigate one so Hoover's wouldn't finish before Fission. In 1645, Egypt, The Ottomans, and Japan have Amphibious War (I think... good job guys).

In 1655 The Mongols demanded Mass Prodcution and I gave it to them... I didn't want to lose any possible votes. The Egyptians exterminated The Mongols in 1675. In 1685, Egypt, The Ottomans, and Sumeria entered the modern age. The Ottomans and Sumeria have Rocketry and Fission, and Egypt has Rocketry. I purchase Fission from Sumeria for 2850 gold. I swap Hoover's to the U. N. and mine all the tiles I can, along with using as many civil engineers as I can. I set the luxury slider up to 100%.

The Ottomans started on the U. N. in 1690. In 1720 I have 1 turn left on the U. N., so I gift *everyone* 200 gold. Scandinavia and Japan feel only "Polite" towards me, while everyone else feels Gracious. I hold elections the next turn... it's Shaka vs. Cleopatra. Cleopatra votes for Cleopatra... *everyone else* votes for Shaka... diplomatic domination complete.

I really limped into the modern age and ran out of breath on this one. I had thought about going for space early on, but basically by the high middle ages this didn't seem all that much of a possibility. Partially researching and partially buying the last three techs, made the diplomatic victory seem all the better. Perhaps the most competitive game I've played to date... and this does include OCC space, cultural, and diplomatic (Monarch "level") and a regular empire-wide Deity victory.

Entry Class: Predator
Finish Date: 1725
Victory Condition: Diplomatic Victory
Firaxis Score: 1147
Jason Score: 4026
Time Played (subtract 3 or 4 hours where I left the game running and went and did other stuff if you like): 11:20:40

Oh... and as I said before I didn't have any cities on a river. I moved two spots north and parked on the coast. Otherwise I doubt I could have done this game as I did. At one point I thought that the spot to the west with the forests might have worked better, since I could have a river and a coast, but I didn't even see it until well after I had gotten into the game. And if it doesn't work out as clear enough yet... all of the citizens of Zululand lived in Zimbabwe. Maybe I'll post some screenies later.

 

[axehaxe]

Predator. Finish date = 1375 AD. Domination Victory. Jason score in the 7000's

Although I normally believe ROP rape is a nooby strategy, I used it twice to finish fast. I had 5 cavalry armies storming their way through the pikeman and spearmen. Although I was aiming for a 20k victory at first, the AI took the most important wonders and pissed me off a bit. So I changed all plans to go AI hunting instead

 

[Chamnix]

Open Class (the difference between the predator class and the open class is just to unsignaficant)

...


All in all I wish the game would have been more differculty. How about no rivers and no bonus for pred class, instead of just losing a worthless tech and having the enemy get better unit support and a free musket or some crap.

Predator class looked too easy, so you played open?

Regardless, it was a very impressive game you played , but I think this was probably the most impressive part to me:

Time played: 04:38:24

 

[Spoonwood]

I also feel rather impressed by that quick finish time of Yilar's. Even if you took away the time I left the computer running and went and did something else, he probably still beat me in time played. I guess I check MapStat a lot or something and he doesn't use such a helper program and/or he has a lot faster computer than I do (inter-turn time on a standard sized map gets long in the modern age.... for a huge map from the late ancient/early medieval period inter-turn time ends up long and gets longer and longer). Here's a screenie of Zimbabwe:

 

[supersova_SU]

interest game...

Yilar = great game -superquick...

My modest unpretentious result -

Domination.
Game date: 490 AD
Firaxis score: 5744
Jason score: 10731

 

[Quintillus]

Another superquick game here:

1982 AD
Cultural 20K Victory
Firaxis score: 1107
Jason score: 1464
Time Played: 3 hr, 48 min, 40 sec

The reason for the superquickness was that I hadn't played Civ for quite awhile, and then went to the GOTM page tonight. Lo and behold, there were 7 hours left for COTM 50. Seeing that it was a Regent level game, I figured I had a chance of finishing it in time with a peaceful strategy, so I downloaded the Open class and started building. I ended up fighting two wars, both against the Scandinavians, having a few more phony wars, having zero luxuries about 90% of the game and 20% luxury slider, and passing up a near-guaranteed diplomatic victory in 1980 for the cultural one I'd been planning. Meanwhile the AI's fought each other like crazy (only ever eliminating Egypt), going fascist fairly early in the Industrial Age and stalling their tech while I flew ahead with Republic. A fun game, if a bit of a whirlwind one.

 

[Scratcher]

Conquest victory in 1060ad. Made the submission with only 2 hours to spare.

4076 firaxis pts, 8700 Jason Pts.

Scratcher

 

[Spoonwood]

How many cities Quintillus? I only had one city... did I actually manage to loose the lowest scoring "award" here AND you had more cities than me?

 

[Quintillus]

How many cities Quintillus? I only had one city... did I actually manage to loose the lowest scoring "award" here AND you had more cities than me?

16 cities by the end of the game, 15 of which I'd had for a thousand years, and 12 of which I had founded.

But it was smitsk00 who beat you for lowest scoring Diplomatic Victory. I could have, but decided to take 20K Cultural instead. He finished a good 200 years later than you, which probably made the difference (I would've been 250 years later).

Lowest-scoring awards are kind of my specialty though - never was a fast finisher year-wise. I'm up to 6 from GOTM and COTM now.

 

[Spoonwood]

Quintillus,

I meant in terms of Firaxis score... of course I didn't say that so you couldn't have known. This may sound like bragging... but in terms of Jason score I ended up 2nd out of 4 for diplomatic victories; I had the second fastest diplomatic victory in terms of finish date also. In terms of Firaxis score you had the lowest score for a victory of any sort. I had the second lowest score for a victory. Of course this just shows you how much information scoring of any sort gives you, at least in my opinion.

 

[LTJG Perry]

Entry class: Open
Game status: Conquest Victory for Zululand
Game date: 1645 AD
Firaxis score: 2932
Jason score: 5929
Time played: 55:02:55

The first time I took good notes and I never got round to posting the synopsis. This was a great game, and I achieved my personal best of razing/capturing 14 cities (Egypt) in one turn. Woot!

Final stats
#1 City Intombe Templar 2557
Civ culture 23036 + 259cpt
Score 2931
Turn 319
Land 1174
Population 607

workers 13 + 109 slaves
cavalry 103
infantry 36
artillery 5
frigate 7
galleon 3
army 10
guerila 2
crusader 5

Cities 64
2648g + 588gpt

I should have speeded this up by not going for ToE/Hoover's and Universal and JSB. That would have been a lot more cavs! Of course then I might not have this:

proudly on display in My Pictures, would I ?

 

[Lanzelot]

Here is finally my "all-in-one" spoiler for COTM50...

Settled in place and started on a second scout. (If I had known that this was an island, I wouldn't have bothered...) The first hut gave me maps and the other two Ceremonial Burial and 25 gold. The first scout quickly discovered the two-game site to the south-east and I decided that that would become my 4-turner location. However it took a very long time to set that up, and in the meantime Zimbabwe cranked out a couple of settlers for the first ring.

After a bit of scouting it quickly became clear that I was isolated, so the third town was set up on the west coast 1W 3SW. The first Curagh went to the "bottleneck" and then followed the coastline of Alpha, heading west, not meeting anybody for centuries... It finally met Egypt and Scandinavia. A second Curagh went east and met the Ottomans.

Republic slingshot was completed 1200BC and I got 4 turns anarchy.

The QSC stats would have been:
9 towns
26 pop
9 workers, 1 settler
7 warriors, 4 archers
15 techs
2 granaries, a barrack and a temple
3 contacts, 1 embassy

Both Curaghs were eventually sunk by barbs, before completing their voyage around the world, but at least they survived long enough to give all contacts except for Japan.

The Middle Ages were reached some time around 600BC.

I had left two barb camps untouched and positioned a stack of Swordsmen next to each in order to start elite farming as soon as the barb uprising would occur. However, what a disappointment: apparently barbs only hatch in the dark...
Should have positioned my stacks one tile further away...

In this game I first tried the "peace treaty + alliance" tactic and it worked astonishingly well: I never had to declare a single war (except for the very end, where I wanted to speed up things a bit). So war happiness was replacing the missing luxuries pretty well, while I was conquering town after town...
The first to declare war on me were the Ottomans. I immediately joined forces with the Mongols, Sumerians and Hittites. I took most of the Ottoman cities and then left one, which was soon afterwards taken by the Sumerians, which ended our peace treaty. Meanwhile I had already regrouped my forces to face the Mongols and Sumerians... When these two auto-declared on me, I joined in some more, and so on...
The only drawback in that first war against Osmania: progress was extremely slow, because they had many towns in that big jungle, and a road network was practically non-existent. What have these loosers been doing all the time?!

I don't remember all the details, but a few noteworthy points are:

• Zimbabwe built the Knights Templar, and those Crusaders are quite useful!
• I got quite a number of great leaders, all of which build Knight Armies.
• Zimbabwe also built the Heroic Epic and later the Military Academy.
• I triggered my GA shortly after my Forbidden Palace was completed in 450AD, using a "stack" of 3 Impis, which I had always kept at the front line for this purpose. Once they spotted a 1-defense unit (I think it was a Longbow), they attacked it, and already the first Impi took it out.
• Also built Smith's Trading Company to save some cash.
• So everything seemed perfect for a fast military victory, but I committed a decisive mistake, which Yilar already pointed out: After Chivalry I continued research on the upper half of the tech tree: Theology -> Education -> Banking, because Engineering (and later Invention) were discovered by the AI and I wanted to trade for them. My plan was to reach steam as soon as possible, as I thought railways were needed for conquering such a large continent, as well as for faster production. Consequently already around 300AD the Temple of Artemis was expired, long before I captured it. So I had to spend a lot of cash on rushing temples.
  I even continued research after steam, thinking I may need Artillery, but that was complete overkill...: I never met any Musketman during the entire game (no one had Saltpeter hooked up), and some AIs didn't even have Iron, so I probably should have stopped research after Chivalry... (Like PrinceMyshkin and Chamnix.)

Fireaxis: 4045
Jason: 8606
Time: 25:55:43 (including one late-night session until 5am to get it in on time...)

Cheers, Lanzelot

 

[Quintillus]

Quintillus,

I meant in terms of Firaxis score... of course I didn't say that so you couldn't have known. This may sound like bragging... but in terms of Jason score I ended up 2nd out of 4 for diplomatic victories; I had the second fastest diplomatic victory in terms of finish date also. In terms of Firaxis score you had the lowest score for a victory of any sort. I had the second lowest score for a victory. Of course this just shows you how much information scoring of any sort gives you, at least in my opinion.

Oh...Firaxis score. That's probably due to my very slow expansion early on. Going for Cultural 20K, I built a lot of wonders and warm fuzzy cultural stuff early on rather than trying to colonize my island. As a result, it took until 1175 BC to get my 3rd city, and 150 BC to get my fifth city. By 440 AD I had 9 cities and 2 settlers, while there were 4 foreign cities on my island. My score at that point was the lowest of any of the 7 civs (myself included) that I knew, at 223 points (Arabia lead with 379). This probably carried over to my low score later on. Happiness wasn't all that low thanks to the luxury slider, although having to use the luxury slider the whole game probably did result in slower advances and thus population growth.