[BTS] Deity One City Challenge on a Huge map with 18 civilizations

[valergrad]

In addition to being a buffer, early production and research needs to directed to key wonders not killing Freddie given you can’t keep his land.

I wouldn’t put my spy points on him if you’re going to take his worker. He’s likely to put his points on you if you declare war on him and I guess there’s a risk that he won’t open borders. My understanding is that both of these factors would increase the cost of stealing techs from him. Lizzie seems a better bet to me.

I thought about this. All your arguments are valid.
The problem is that I want to steal technology from him earlier - before i'll get Galley and even learn Sailing.
Also, as I see in XML file Frederick agrees to open the borders and trade techs even he is annoyed. The same is for happy resources and only for health resources he needs to be cautious. So, until I get -9 with him it is fine. About espionage weight - you're right, he will give me higher weight. But the same we can say about Elisabeth too - right now she knows only me, it will be hard for her to meet anybody else, as she is on the island, so she just don't have another option.
May be the best person for espionage will be none of them, for example, Caesar or Isabella ( that I currently haven't met). Will try to think on it each move analysing the new information.

 

[valergrad]

So, I've taken the worker, and started to build a warrior.

Now it is T2.

As you see, @Powerfaker, Freddi has a warrior in the city. And second settler. This is probably the difference between immortal with deity. So you just can't destroy him by now.

I use pigs ( 3F 1C ) for making a warrior. Another options - is wine cell ( 2F 2C ) or marble ( 2F 1H 1C) or even a stone ( 1F 2H 1C ). But it looks to me that fastest grows now is the most important. But if somebody says it is not - I would reconsider.
Plan for a warrior - is go to SE to meet other civs. Fast pace is essential before closed borders will close everything. And I want to meet other civs to be able to trade from first civ alphabet - I don't know who it will be, so I want to meet everyone. Except Mansa Musa. Meeting Mansa Musa I want to avoid at all cost for now, as i want to meet him only after an initial tech trades - for him do not increase my "tech whore" counter. Another civ I don't want to meet for now is Kate - because she is really demanding and capricious, but it is not in my will.
Plan for a worker - go to wheat cell and farm it for +2F. It will finish the work exactly when the city will grow. There is a barbarian hut at top, but it looks like that Frederick's scout will be there first, so no sense to send there a worker.

Espionage. Lisa - 6/0, Freddi - 12/4. Looks like AI starts with bonus on Espionage, can't explain otherwise how they got 12 points at move 2.

 

[Powerfaker]

@valergrad Apparently a warrior indeed, my mistake ....... and half my comments down the drain.
And yeah, makes most sense to grow now. Well, you know well what you are doing is my impression.

 

[krikav]

Since everyone said it was impossible, I decided to give a OCC with conquest in mind a go... And I failed rather horribly.

I replayed the opening several times for some stuff "Once under a blue moon" to click.
I popped mining and then masonry from the piggy-hut up west, and the scandinavian one.
Stole a worker from Freddy, and then razed his capital for another worker at 25% odds.
So pretty much everything is absurdly rigged in the players advantage.

Built SH, ToAR, TGW, Oracle and Pyramids, founded judaism and the shrine, got an academy timely and also managed to unlock heroic.
Then at around T150 I had to cheat again and prevent Qin who was running away completly despite my best efforts, from winning lib. (Into worldbuilder and remove philo+edu+paper for him each turn, take that Qin!)
But then I got steel and made short work of Isabella who I had farmed TGW-experience with for quite some time for 2-3 settled generals.
I kept up in tech decently and was able to 1-turn any 17xp unit of my choice and could also buy any resource due to the cash from settled prophets and the shine
Got Julius down to 1 city and a vassal, then some progress against Alex to get Julius some cities.
Then I started to work through Cathy... But my GOD it's frustrating to try get a vassal to conquer cities. >_<
Had to throw in the towel at T272 because there is simply no way to get up a sufficient pace.

Never played earth18civ before, have through it to be abit silly when they just start with warriors and are so ripe for exploitation, but I'm starting to think that this can be tough even without the OCC setting.

But conquest in OCC, as you others have pointed out is probably off the table. At least I can't figure out how it could even be theoretically possible.

 

[Mr_Trotsky]

It’s true that Fred will open borders at annoyed but I’m not sure that’s still true if you’re his worst enemy? However, having thought about it more I don’t think it matters. I think you get the espionage reduction if you have trade routes with the target city and not just from having open borders (?). Given that, until currency, you’ll only have one trade route, I doubt that’ll be with Germany as you’ll start earning the years of peace trade route bonus later with him than you will Izzy, Lizzie and JC etc (unless you worker steal from them too). Also, once you get sailing I assume you’ll end up with trade routes with Lizzie because she’s overseas. This pushes you towards Lizzie being a better longer term target. Another factor is Paris might start putting its culture on London earlier than Berlin which would make tech stealing cheaper. However, I’m not sure how culture spread works across the ocean. Some stuff to research/ponder.

 

[krikav]

However, I’m not sure how culture spread works across the ocean. Some stuff to research/ponder.

I flipped and thus razed London eventually in my trial game so it does spread over water.
Not sure how it effects espionage though.

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

Since everyone said it was impossible, I decided to give a OCC with conquest in mind a go... And I failed rather horribly.

I replayed the opening several times for some stuff "Once under a blue moon" to click.
I popped mining and then masonry from the piggy-hut up west, and the scandinavian one.
Stole a worker from Freddy, and then razed his capital for another worker at 25% odds.
So pretty much everything is absurdly rigged in the players advantage.

There lies the problem with benchmarking OCC on a fixed map - so many things can drastically change the outcome. Early AI oracle? Oops. Great Prophet instead of Scientist? Darn. Wrong religion spread? No coalition, risky religion civic.

@krikav What do you think of this strategy for conquest?

Spoiler :

Julius Caesar --> Oracle Monarchy, Iron Working, limp to Feudalism on pillage gold. Start attempting to acquire vassals

Vassal 1 with Settler at 350 BC... not great but not terrible either.

 

[Mr_Trotsky]

I flipped and thus razed London eventually in my trial game so it does spread over water.
Not sure how it effects espionage though.

Given that I spend most of my life with French people in London that’s slightly alarming but in terms of the game it suggests that French culture spreads just fine to London and Lizzie is likely to be a good tech stealing target.

 

[krikav]

@CarpoolKaraoke

Spoiler :

I still like GProphets. They add hammers and gold, both of which is really nice. Beakers isn't end all be all if you are going conquest at all.
But you do need one GSci for the academy!

I think that strategy might work out much better. You have a early strong UU that you can wreck havoc with, you are IMP which is a godsend.
Getting early feud and start aquiring vassals is probably key, have to make it happen in the medieval era to have any chance I think. I got my first with cannons after T150 and that was to late.

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

@CarpoolKaraoke

Spoiler :

I still like GProphets. They add hammers and gold, both of which is really nice. Beakers isn't end all be all if you are going conquest at all.
But you do need one GSci for the academy!

I think that strategy might work out much better. You have a early strong UU that you can wreck havoc with, you are IMP which is a godsend.
Getting early feud and start aquiring vassals is probably key, have to make it happen in the medieval era to have any chance I think. I got my first with cannons after T150 and that was to late.

Oh, just in time:

Spoiler :

This brute won't vassal to me. I give up.

Are you doing fine on your own though?????

 

[valergrad]

@krikav, I am glad that you've tried it. For me it was too scary even to try

For the culture spread - it is totally fine within ocean, right.

It’s true that Fred will open borders at annoyed but I’m not sure that’s still true if you’re his worst enemy? However, having thought about it more I don’t think it matters. I think you get the espionage reduction if you have trade routes with the target city and not just from having open borders (?). Given that, until currency, you’ll only have one trade route, I doubt that’ll be with Germany as you’ll start earning the years of peace trade route bonus later with him than you will Izzy, Lizzie and JC etc (unless you worker steal from them too). Also, once you get sailing I assume you’ll end up with trade routes with Lizzie because she’s overseas. This pushes you towards Lizzie being a better longer term target. Another factor is Paris might start putting its culture on London earlier than Berlin which would make tech stealing cheaper. However, I’m not sure how culture spread works across the ocean. Some stuff to research/ponder.

Thank you, I didn't know that espionage is cheaper if this is your trade route.
Will take this into account!
Agree that after I'll get sailing I should spend my espionage points to Lizzie.

 

[krikav]

@CarpoolKaraoke
I have tried to learn vassal mechanics a few times but the numbers havn't stuck in my brain yet.
But I think you need twice the number of land tiles compared to the AI you want to vassal.
I was helped with having alot of land tiles with Paris, but in reality you need to smash the AI down into a little coastal city to have a chance.
Not an easy task! And for subsequent vassals your first vassal counts as half, so it's very frustrating when you are clearing a enemy city turn after turn and the moron you are trying to help are just moving his doomstack back and forth, back and forth.

 

[valergrad]

T3.
Worker is going to wheat tile, but made a stop on a pigs tile with a pre-road.
Warrior got SE and met Alexander.
Plans are still the same, except I think no need to hide that I am going to learn Mysticism.
Trade routes with Lizzy, perfect.

Looking at relationships: all AI's aren't met each other yet.

 

[SillyGoat]

It’s true that Fred will open borders at annoyed but I’m not sure that’s still true if you’re his worst enemy? However, having thought about it more I don’t think it matters. I think you get the espionage reduction if you have trade routes with the target city and not just from having open borders (?). Given that, until currency, you’ll only have one trade route, I doubt that’ll be with Germany as you’ll start earning the years of peace trade route bonus later with him than you will Izzy, Lizzie and JC etc (unless you worker steal from them too). Also, once you get sailing I assume you’ll end up with trade routes with Lizzie because she’s overseas. This pushes you towards Lizzie being a better longer term target. Another factor is Paris might start putting its culture on London earlier than Berlin which would make tech stealing cheaper. However, I’m not sure how culture spread works across the ocean. Some stuff to research/ponder.

Culture spread over ocean works the same as normal but you can only spread culture to tiles that can be worked from the continent that the culture spreading city is on. (not necessarily from that city, just from somewhere on it's continent)

 

[valergrad]

Culture spread over ocean works the same as normal but you can only spread culture to tiles that can be worked from the continent that the culture spreading city is on. (not necessarily from that city, just from somewhere on it's continent)

Oh, that explains a lot, thank you! Does this mean I'll never get this tasty wheat tile upper the London?

 

[valergrad]

T4.

Paris border expands and we met Caesar because of that.
We have signed off peace treaty with Frederick - hopefully nobody objects against it.
Worker starts it's job on wheat's tile.
Warrior is now where in reality is Slovenia.

Also this move I am starting project for understanding real peaceWeights of all AI's. This is hidden parameters that influence the AI's attitude against each other ( but not with human player ). May be this is not important to know, but may be it will help later if we will try to win some apostolic or diplomatic voting.

How this works? Each AI gets iBasePeaceWeight from XML file and at the beginning of the game each AI also add to this value random number - 0, 1 or 2.
For example, Lisa has 9 and Frederick 8. This means that in concrete game it could be 11 for Lisa and 8 for Frederick. Or 8 for Lisa and 10 for Frederick.

This hidden attitude they get will be 4 in case of this parameter equal, and -1 for each difference between them.

Another hidden parameters are:
-1 - it is just start for all AI's at Deity level.
IbaseAttitude from XML - it is 1 for both Lisa and Freddy.
iWarmongerRespect from XML - in attitude it will be max for both of them. It is 0 for both Lisa and Freddy, so it will be 0.
+1 if they both in the bottom half of the scoreboard - this probably doesn't apply to them for now as Lisa is first in visible part of scoreboard, I don't believe she can be in the bottom half in the overall scoreboard.
And iWorseRankDiffrenceChange/iBetterRankDifferenceChange - parameters from XML that can get some change if one leader is much higher/lower in the scoreboard than the another. But for Frederick and Lisa this parameters are not big, so this is also should be 0.

So, now we see that Lisa is pleased with Freddi and Freddi is pleased with Lisa ( >= 3). Visible relations between them is 0, hidden is 0 as shows my calculations before. This means that this peaceWeight-based parameter give them at least +3 in attitude. So we can say that baseWeight between them is equal or differ not more than 1. We can't say what is it exactly for now, but we definitely can exclude some combinations ( to be more accurate - 3 combinations out of 9 ). I hope that if I'll analyse all pairs every move, I'll be able to calculate or baseWeights for all leaders, and hence will be able to calculate relations between them with 100% accuracy.
It will be just an interesting puzzle to get all this values.

( the same analysis of Alexander - Caesar relationships gives nothing for now)

 

[NothingBesideRemains]

@CarpoolKaraoke
I have tried to learn vassal mechanics a few times but the numbers havn't stuck in my brain yet.
But I think you need twice the number of land tiles compared to the AI you want to vassal.
I was helped with having alot of land tiles with Paris, but in reality you need to smash the AI down into a little coastal city to have a chance.
Not an easy task! And for subsequent vassals your first vassal counts as half, so it's very frustrating when you are clearing a enemy city turn after turn and the moron you are trying to help are just moving his doomstack back and forth, back and forth.

I think the key in a OCC military victory like this is you need to vassal at least one civ super early - early enough that they have a chance to actually expand after you vassal them.

Needing 2x the land / pop as your first target means likely pinning them to 1 city before they cap. If you could Oracle feudalism that might be possible (this can work on a hand picked normal map, but probably not here - doubtful even if you get some nice techs from huts! Maybe if an AI alsp got early alpha and you were able to trade for Monarchy or even writing?). If you declare early war against that civ to choke them before you get feudalism, that could also help.

Only chance I see is something like going France, choking both Fred and Izzy (need to declare war on her before the world turns Buddhist) Oracling Feud (if that is absolutely impossible, oracling probably like metal casting and trading it for Monarchy, getting in a cheeky forge), vassling Fred, then vassling Liz (can't vassel her first as her single holy city will have more land than yours), then quickly vassling London and any other Civ with limited land.

Note that such a quick push likely means the only early wonder you can get is Oracle (maybe SH if you want the relevant quick culture and early prophet).

If those first few vassals have the ability to do any teching, then you might be able to do a slow crawl through Europe with catapults then trebs then cannons (gotta limit your losses as a OCC!).

No matter how you slice it, at some point the world gets rifles, and hopefully by that point you have enough vassals to press on regardless.

Never tried this on this map, but I doubt it's possible.

 

[valergrad]

I think the key in a OCC military victory like this is you need to vassal at least one civ super early - early enough that they have a chance to actually expand after you vassal them.

But if they expand on more than 100% of your land - aren't they will immediately free themselves? Sorry if this is a stupid question, I haven't a lot of experience in this vassal games. I just have got impression that if civs land become larger than it was during vassalization AND more than 100% of master civs land - it will free itself.

 

[valergrad]

As there is no change in strategy or not yet something to think about or discuss, I'll continue and make one more move.

T5.

No events for this move, worker continue it's march to Middle East ( where he will meet Saladin/Cyrus and probably Hatshepsut ).

Freddi met Caesar and Alexander. Analyzing their relationship gives me not a lot of information, just understanding that Freddi peaceWeight - Alexander peaceWeight <= 8.
Right now we can predict only that Alexander will be probably the enemy of all civs in this area, because of this peaceWeight parameter.

Espionage: Lisa 21/0, Freddi 28/16, Caesar 10/0, Alexander 12/0.

Took screenshot of demo just in case. May be somebody can get some information from this.

 

[NothingBesideRemains]

But if they expand on more than 100% of your land - aren't they will immediately free themselves? Sorry if this is a stupid question, I haven't a lot of experience in this vassal games. I just have got impression that if civs land become larger than it was during vassalization AND more than 100% of master civs land - it will free itself.

To my understanding, there are 2 types of vassals - war vassals (they capitulate as part of a peace treaty to end the war) and peace vassals (they offer to be your vassal when you are at peace amd if they really like you). These types have different attributes. In particular, peace vassals can break away if they become too large relative to your size, whereas war vassals can break away if they become too small relative to their original size when they capitulated.

(If Im wrong on any of this please correct me, Im no expert).