CTR 5 -- Wonderhogs

[ChrTh]

I had been thinking about doing a 20K Emperor Challenge for CTR 5, but then I started thinking that it would essentially become a math equation. And while I'm reasonably competent in math, I don't want it to dominate an SG.

So instead I'm starting a game that'll likely get us a 20k Victory, but without all the Math

I call it: WONDERHOGS

Here's how it works:
We have only one city where we can build Wonders; it doesn't have to be our capital (and probably shouldn't), but it's the only one where we can build Wonders (Large and Small--except for FP, although if it's not our capital, it'll likely get FP anyway). Note, I'm not saying 'complete', I'm saying 'build', so you can't prebuild using Wonders either in any other city (for pre-industrialization factory pre-builds, for example).

But besides only have one Wonderful (literally) city, there's another catch: We don't want any other Civ to have a Great Wonder. At all. Here's the fun part: if another Civ builds a Wonder, we have to do one of the following:
1) If we've already contacted them, we must immediately declare war (unless doing so would violate a 20-turn agreement; once the 20-turns are passed, we can't renew the deal and must declare war) and we must continue to prosecute the war until the city with the Wonder is RAZED--then we can make Peace.

2) If we've not met them yet, once we do, we must immediately declare war. Unlike an AW, there's no 'trade then declare' provision in place, it's war war WAR! until the city with the Wonder is RAZED. No delays, either--if a Contact with the Civ is available, we should try to get it.


So that's it. One of the advantages of the 'razing other Wonders' is that we don't require our Wonder city to be on the coast.

I'm open to any suggestions regarding Civ, geography, victory conditions*, and difficulty levels.

Roster:
ChrTh
leha
Dark Savant
Darkness
?????
????? ?


*Regarding victory conditions, I think the game shouldn't end until ALL Wonders are built, but I can't think of a way to guarantee that short of waiting for Conquests...

 

[Leha]

Seems interesting .
I'd like to sign in but :

1) I'm comfort with monarch but never played emperor .
2) I can start playing only in 4-5 days ( I'll have ADSL line then )

Am I NO PASS ?

 

[ChrTh]

leha:

I don't think I'll do this one on Emperor, probably Monarch--but it depends on who signs up.

The game will be PTW 1.27f, so let me know if that prevents you from playing. If that's not an issue, I'll add you to the roster, and we'll see when we get started where you'll be in the roster.

 

[Leha]

ChrTh , I have PTW 1.21f . I'll upgrade it to 1.27 as soon as I'm hooked to internet .
Monarch would be great . Sign me in ,then

 

[Rubberjello]

I'm debating about joining this one, but I'm a tad over-commited at this point.

Actually, I liked your "Illuminati Underground " idea better, how come it never got started?

Thoughts:
Unless you want to do a hell of a lot of Wonder razing, you might want to avoid Emporer level. I have found it extremely tough to get more than 2 of the 7 Ancient and the first 4 Middle Age Wonders in my Emp. games. Wonders after that are "fairly" easy to nail in most games. If you get a wide range of opponents building these early wonders, then you may well end up in an "all-war" scenario, rather than what you are after, so I would recommend Monarch level.

Additionally, you need a good starting location, and (this is the tricky part), an outstanding second city location (if the non-capital route is chosen).

In terms of Civ choice: you might consider the counter-intuitive expansionist trait. An early settler or city from a hut pop would help this variant immensely and allow you to get some ancient Wonders much easier.

 

[ChrTh]

@Rubberjello:

The Illuminati Underground idea died because too many similar games were started. I will probably resurrect it later.

 

[Dark Savant]

AM7 is probably dead, so I want to take a crack at this.

Monarch would probably be best for this, yes -- on Emperor, if you focus all your building efforts in one very strong city in an excellent location (the capital, or the second city), you can usually get something like 3 Ancient and 5 Middle Ages wonders, but then we'd have to raze the remaining 8 wonders, which'll probably be a lot of war. I'd rather not have that much war.

In addition, it's probably worthwhile to devote all of our non-Wonder cities to building military. It's great for snagging GL's and for nailing cities on Wonder builds. Getting GL's are how you stack 15-20 Wonders in a single city on Monarch.

Do we want to turn off Cultural victory, just so we can see how many Wonders we can stack in a single city?

We absolutely want Industrious, as this makes getting early wonders much easier. The Pyramids are pretty much a lock on Monarch with Industrious if you start it right away in your second city in a reasonably productive location. It should start the wonder immediately upon founding; we can bring in second-ring tiles by founding additional cities.

The second trait should be either Militaristic or maybe Scientific, I think. We can't count on the bonuses provided by Expansionist, and besides, I'm getting more than my fair share of America in Epic 36.

I'd thus vote for China as the civ to play. I'd also vote for restarting until we find a quality second-city site (fresh water, coast, food bonuses, bonus grass, and hills in some tasty combination).

Also, what barb settings are we going to use? I think the barb level should be kept fairly low.

 

[ChrTh]

@DS: Welcome aboard!

How about The Ottomans? Industrious and Scientific, kickass UU (although we'll trip the GA if we get GL and one of Pyramids, Great Wall, or Hanging Gardens in the Ancient Age--if we miss GL, we may not get our GA until Sipahi) and they start out able to build Colossus AND Pyramids (although I suspect we won't be able to get both: Pyramids is more important--second city should probably start right away). Another benefit is that I've never played them

When I play the first 20 turns, if the situation looks hopeless I'll start again, but if we play Monarch (likely), a 'workable' start will probably be enough. I'll use my judgement :devil2:

I always play Barbarians at Roaming, so that's what it'll be

 

[ChrTh]

A couple other things:

I think Space Race, Domination, and Conquest will be the enabled Victory conditions; we will only be able to win Space Race--the other two are there to keep us from conquering everybody and playing alone for 500+ years.

We can not build (but can use as prebuild) any SS Part until we've built/razed every Wonder.

Iron Works does not have to be built in our Wonder City .. it and the FP can be built elsewhere.

We need to do everything we need to in order to trigger the Small Wonders so that our Wonder City can build them.

Geography and opponents will probably be random. Standard map.

The Ottomans are pretty much a given, the more I think about 'em, the more I think they're perfect for this game.

 

[Leha]

I thought you ment no prebuilds before ?

All the rest is OK by me ( although I like GA before Sipahi are available )

 

[Leha]

ChrTh , my shift at work is coming to an end .
I hope I'll get ADSL in monday . Till then I'll be offline .
Once again , Ottomans and map settings are OK by me .
See you all soon .

 

[ChrTh]

Originally posted by leha
I thought you ment no prebuilds before ?

Other cities can not use Wonder prebuilds (for example, I might be 10 turns from Industrialization, and I have a different city start TOE ... not to finish it, but in anticipation of switching it over to a factory once I discover Industrialization) ... but they can use Spaceship prebuilds (for example, start building SS Lounge in order to get a head start on Manufacturing Plants). However, the spaceship parts can not be in prebuild mode when the final Wonder is built; if they are, they need to be swapped to something else.

I hope I made that clear enough ...

 

[Leha]

OK , I see .
I rarely get to SS parts .

 

[Dark Savant]

I think the Ottomans are actually a poor choice. There are about five or six other civs I'd rather play, actually. By I+S I was thinking of Persia.

The trouble with the Ottomans is that their unit comes too late to be of much value for the purposes of this variant -- we ought to have no trouble getting all the Industrial and Modern wonders in our wonder city, and we'll be fighting lots of wars much earlier than that. We need to have some strong unit that will come along earlier.

Also, if we miss the Great Library, we're going to have a rather late Golden Age.

Sipahi may normally be strong, but in this variant they just aren't going to be that useful, I think. Here's a strong "NO" for the Ottomans -- I'd rather play any other Industrious civ, excepting the Americans.

Also, starting with Bronze Working really isn't that big a deal -- it's cheap to research ourselves on Monarch, and the AI's will more often than not research it first anyway.

 

[Leha]

Generally , I agree with DS , but I think Immortal gives very early GA , so I don't think Persia is good . Sipahi comes late , true . But wasted early GA may be critical for this variant .

 

[ChrTh]

@DS: I understand your concerns, so I, being quite fair and democratic-minded, will put it up for a vote. Each player can choose whom they think would be best for this variant.

ChrTh: Ottomans
Leha:
Dark Savant:

There are still some roster spots left, all you lurking people

 

[Leha]

Ok . I have ADSL line .

 

[ChrTh]

Excellent. We'll see if we can get a couple more players before we start.

 

[Darkness]

I'm interested, and I've got two questions and two suggestions

- What patch?

- What map size? With this twist larger will mean more difficult.

- Monarch level seems like a good idea, as this variant won't make us very popular with the AIs and difficult is good, but impossible is not good...

- And I think China (Industious/Militaristic), with a great UU at an excellent time, would be a good civ for this game

 

[ChrTh]

1.27f PTW, but from what I understand, 1.21 and 1.27 are compatible with one another.

It would be on a Standard Map