Deity Isolation Workshop (Stan/Norm/Fractal/NH/NE)

That was the idea, 3 cities were settled on Optics turn (last one a bit delayed because I had to build a trireme) :)
 
Sooo, a little case for IND am sure you remember this map ;)

We could talk about for hours how safe an Oracle at t57 is ~~
..but it's bringing excitement and different gameplay either way.

(i added forge + factory for IND illusion while building SH & Oracle, and removed them when not. SH going late actually delayed Oracle a bit cos i had hoped for earlier gold while teching PH)
 

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I've never said that IND was a bad trait. I said it could be very strong in some cases.

Now T57 certainly isn't safe, but it's not a horrible gamble either, and can definitely make the game more fun -- depends on your playstyle.

But here, what are you going to Oracle anyway? Monarchy? Not really useful.. Would be really good if you could Oracle MC or CoL (cheap SPI temples, play around with CS etc.), but it's simply not possible on this map.

But I ofc agree that IND can be very useful on some low-commerce starts :)

(Oh and btw you went through Meditation even though you have marble -- no ToA failgold grandplan? :p)

Edit - actually if you go Hunt-AH-Fishing-PH-Writing you might be able to Oracle CoL = hit the jackpot. Have to try some stuff with this map :scan:

The thing I dislike the most about the Oracle here is that you might pop some stupid great priest (probably ok if you get only one, but what if every GP you get turns out to be a priest? :satan:)
 
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Another thing is that I find it much more motivating to play a game where I'm fighting to win, and not to get a fancy win date. I actually find it pretty hard to keep playing a game that you're 95% sure to win after having played to T50, not sure how you deal with this.

If I had one question to ask you, Rusten, I'd ask how you manage to remain motivated and play a game to the end after noticing the mistakes you've made earlier (even small mistakes) -- that's the reason why I drop 99% of my games, because I don't find any appeal to finish a game that is not "good". I know that's wrong, but I just can't get over it.
Just accept that there's no perfect game and move on. Playing multiplayer and various gamemodes might help because you're forced to dealing with factors outside of the base game throwing a wrench in your plans all the time. Need to be able to reset and come up with the best plan from point X quite often. But overall I enjoy noticing small mistakes, that's how I stop to think and figure things out. Asking why the other path was better and identifying the conditions. They don't cause me to lose motivation in any way.

On the T50 part: I get my kick from figuring out the best solution to a problem. I don't focus so much on the win itself which makes it easy to play games even when they're "decided". Probably because I've played for so many years that the AI rarely poses a challenge. More than 10 years on this forum now! 10!!
Single player is just a relaxing sandbox mode at this point -- if you want a real challenge then go sign up for a MP pitboss on realmsbeyond.

I'd also recommend doing something other than domination/conquest all the time to keep it interesting. Learning what makes a new VC "tick" is fun to me at least. For instance I had a culture phase in BOTM ~2 years ago.
Spoiler :
Real culture that is -- not the espionage garbage (patch please :help:).
 
Well Monarchy is useful on all maps with no happy res, imo..Mecca might not be a great cap, but there are 2 green tiles that can be cottaged, and the pigs site has plenty green river (and also plains river). I would probably turn this city into my Bur Cap later with Monarchy, no issues chopping the Palace after border pop as needed (another advantage of IND, costs 50% less).

I dun think priest points would be an issue, sure you might get one but there's worse than 2h5g settled or golden age.
Also you assume all GP come from Mecca which would ofc not be the case.
(i did play as if SPI gets replaced by IND, ofc with both CoL would be much stronger)
 
A new game, Stalin :)
He was mentioned at some point as agg leader not played yet.
Spoiler :
stalin-jpg.484966

Played to turn 50 and happy with this map, some nice stuff to work with but nothing too good.
Already can see many questions and decisions now, looks perfect for training.
 

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Turn 50 thoughts
Spoiler :
So there's stone, but rather far away. I put my overflow beakers into writing, i guess it's not good enuf for any Pyras tries..but you could.
I am thinking that with silver, IND could become useful in another way thou: Forge for +2 total happy, allows skipping Mona.
Also that 1 tile island is interesting, could take 1 floodplains (if no seafood, but maybe even then).
Decided i want slavery and whip my 2nd settler, will be useful later too.
Forgot using another name, so you play as Fippy sowy ;)
 

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@Rusten that's good advice. What are Pitboss MP and realmsbeyond? How do you sign up for these things?

@Fippy I'll play this as soon as I finish my current game. Trying to play a map to the end for once :)

Oh and could you turn yields on when you post screenies? Makes it more readable when you don't know the map.
 
Well I'm at 800BC right now lol, but I'll play this one to the end no matter what -- or I promise I'll isolate myself completely from any civ stuff for an entire month (would be horrible :D). But I can attach the starting save if you want to play. Have a few early game saves aswell. (Didn't post the map here at first partly cos I thought Fippy would find boring AF -- was I right? :mischief:)

Spoiler :

wGx8ihK.jpg


No one here has ever played a low commerce toku iso before, right?
 

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Pitboss was/is the program used to play Civ 4 multiplayer (MP). I don't know a great deal about it other than it can create a game server to host a MP game and it used to be kind of clunky. I'm guessing it's really showing it's age these days unless it's seen improvements.

Realms Beyond is a really old website/forum dedicated to the Civ franchise. They used to organize big GOTM type games over there and i believe they called them "epics." They were typically a little more role-playing style, as was the site in general (the players and the information over there were less advanced than on this site). They also used to organize some big MP games from time to time. I haven't been over on that site in several years so I don't know what kind of following they have at this point.
 
That's quite nice to have an active Civ community in your country -- I haven't heard of anything similar in France..
 
Saves from my practice game. Could have got Optics earlier, but would be far behind in infra & cities. A few things could have been optimized a bit better, but I'm pretty satisfied with the overall timing. Should be in a decent position if the AIs are not monsters.

If you're going to look at the saves, I'd suggest you play it to, Lain (doesn't matter if you play fast), to get a feel for the map. I also think it's a very good island for practice (can probably say that for all games, but idk, I really enjoyed this one).
I'll play it to the end, not sure how long it's gonna take.
 

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T70, an interesting setup.
Spoiler :
Not cheap, but i want that island for trade routes so plan whipping the galley next turn (preventing barb galleys, which would be reaaaally annoying from there). St. Peters will also whip the settler for that, and get chop for library.
Silver city was interesting, i decided it's worth settling coastal and pre-chopped with 1 worker. Library can be done with chops & whip, makes it slower getting silver but should be better later.
 

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My game @600AD -
Spoiler :

No Guilds trade, DoW going to come quite late. Right now I think I'll go Cannons-Rifles and take out Vicky (she's got the GLH). Then hopefully kill Pacal if he isn't too close to dangerous stuff. Backup plan would be taking out Brennus, who is pretty weak. Looking at the other AIs, there will be some nasty late-game wars if I want to win domination :eek:

Of course, the first war has to go well if I want even the slightest chance at winning domination.
 

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Well it's a low commerce start. And while the island has some growth potential, it does still have lower commerce than 90% of the maps played here. Now ofc it has a decent amount of land and resources to trade after Astro, so it's not necessarily very hard.
 
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