Donny Brook
Warlord
- Joined
- Sep 9, 2004
- Messages
- 120
Recently I submitted my third HOF game, which luckily ranked #1 as of the time of writing this thread (Feb 2009). 
While I take some pride in that accomplishment, I realize that:
1. A huge histographic game is a major committment (six months in my case) so there's a relatively small number of submissions for this type of game.
2. Given that committment, most of the higher level players would be unlikely to revisit the lower difficulty levels to try and better their score.
3. Much that is known today about game mechanics, utilities and other "best practices" was not available to HOF entrants from the past.
I still don't consider myself to play at a high level and six months ago I'm certain I was worse. So I didn't keep any records of my progress to teach others how to play. This is my post-mortum account as best as I can remember it and it's meant for Emperor-or-lower level players. It's also important to note that the strategy for any high score histo attempt is very dependant on the difficulty level. These ideas worked fine for Emperor but are likely to be less than optimal for other levels.
Set-up
The standard warm, wet, 5 billion archipelago which is typical for many histo attempts. I will play as the Iroquois, which are a favoured choice for HOF games. For opponents, I chose America, Inca, Russia, Sumeria, Ottomans, Persia, Germany and Babylon. These are all the scientific tribes who don't start with Alphabet plus I chose America and Inca (with culturally-linked start locations) so I could hopefully be near two tribes who knew Masonry so I could trade for it early with a view to hand-building the Pyramids.
I used sedentary barbs which is useful in two ways:
1. At this level, it's reasonably likely to pop a settler.
2. The tech pace at Emperor seemed too slow for my liking for a really high scoring game.
The downside is that the gov't slingshots aren't likely to work as you lessen your chances of being the first to discover Philosophy. Having huts on meant that it was especially important that I could trade for Masonry very early while I still had something to offer.
Mapfinder found a 4448 limit with a one-cow start which seemed ideal.
The Early Game
With no huts, I typically build a settler first, and then a granary for a settler factory. With huts on, however, my strategy was to pop a settler for my second city so that the capital could begin work on the granary sooner and get the factory up and running. I went worker-granary as my first two builds because I needed a second worker to pop the huts.
Several maps were abandoned when my strategy didn't work. Finally I was able to pop one and founded my second city in 3250BC. IIRC, I chopped one forest so by 3250BC, I had two cities, two workers and a settler factory that was at or near completion. That's only 15 turns into the game! The early game is vital to everything that follows and my next 500+ turns were all beneficiaries of these early accomplishments. Much to my dismay, I then noticed in CAII that I hadn't selected Scientific Leaders. Anyway, I wasn't gonna abandon this great start so I carried on (they're optional for a HOF submission).
The Remainder of the QSC Stage
The second city immediately started a pre-build for the Pyramids which was completed in 1300BC. By 1000BC, I had 18 cities, 134 shields toward the ToA and 114 shields in another pre-build which became the Statue of Zeus ten turns later. I had also made four contacts and the slingshot didn't work as I suspected. Too late on Philo with the huts being on. I'd do that differently next time and wouldn't even try for it. Math was due in three turns and then I self-researched Monarchy.
The First War
I was ready for my first battle in 230BC. I had a "force" of four veteran (5/5) ancient cavalry and seven catapults on the American border. I triggered my Golden Age and began the first assault.
I'm a big believer in an early GA for huge histo games. The timing of my GA meshed nicely with running out of land for expansion. Another map would have allowed for more peaceful growth.
You have a period of rapid growth via the settler factory(s) followed immediately by another period of rapid growth during your GA. From then on, the game is won and you've also maxed out your score to this stage. In my case that's about 135 turns (to ~150AD) where there's little else I could have done to maximize my score. That's one-quarter of the entire game. The ToA was hand-built in 470BC which further improved my score. Additionally, I had been maximizing the number of happy faces since the start.
Here's a look at the state of affairs just before I begin my GA:
http://[URL=http://s639.photobucket.com/albums/uu120/dr1w/?action=view¤t=GoldenAge230BC.jpg]
[/URL]
The Second Quarter - 150AD to 1400AD
Again, the goal is to maximize score. To do that, we'll have to take territory by force to reach the domination limit ASAP. At this level, you should have achieved domination by the end of the second quarter. I don't have a lot of game saves during this period because it's just your typical warring type events and I wasn't really planning on doing the type of play-by-play commentary that I find so entertaining (see Chamnix current SID game). Suffice it to say that I reached the DL around 1350AD-1380AD.
There's one thing I tried which really didn't work which is the 512 city trick. Essentially, you ICS to try and get to maximum cities (512) ASAP. That prevents the AI from building any more cities. Well, by the time I accomplished that goal, I was on the verge of wiping out my second last opponent anyway. The final opponent was Persia, on a smallish island, backward with about 10 cities. I was wiping him out before he settled any bothersome colonies on small islands. So in hindsight, I'd say it was hardly worth devoting any effort towards it. Still, I imagine all those cities helped me in other ways.
The third and fourth quarters are simply milking to improve score. Here's an interesting screenshot of where I did an outstanding job on my border expansions.
http://[URL=http://s639.photobucket.com/albums/uu120/dr1w/?action=view¤t=borderexpansion.jpg]
[/URL]
Notice that in all this rocky terrain, I'm using only one hill tile. Another good tip is that you can sometimes grab an extra single tile with a border expansion to the third level (i.e. beyond 100 culture points). Have a look at city ">100 Culture?". By letting this city expand past 100 culture points, I was able to grab a single floodplains tile without also expanding into a mountain tile.
Anyway, that part of the game is mildly amusing. The rest of the milking stage is rather tiresome. I have no doubt that I could have placed a city here or there to make an extra few points, but I don't think it amounts to much.
Things I Could Have (or You Could!) Do Better
While the high DL was nice, I have three big continents which made for a lot of island hopping. Keldr has a nice Emperor level game going with a DL almost as good as mine but he's got a virtual pangea despite it being an archipelago. Such a map lends itself to reaching the DL faster. Plus I only had Pyramids on one continent, JS Bach's was on another, etc. This worked to my detriment.
The top three Emperor level games prior to mine were all pangeas with DL's around 4000 or less as I recall. In my mind, that couldn't stand up to a vitual pangea at 4250+. So in my post-game analysis, I'd say that you really want a pangea-like map, even if it means a slightly lower DL. Be forewarned however, that you'd devote a lot of time to a game before you really knew for sure how many continents you're dealing with.
As I said earlier, I've seen lots of other maps where more peaceful expansion is possible, but it wasn't in the cards for me on this one. That probably hurt my score, but since I was a warrior nation, it didn't affect me as much. I don't think being Mayan would have worked well on this map. I have started a new DG game as the Iroquois again, but I can now see how it would actually favour being Mayan. I have lots of vacant land at 250AD, but it's taking me forever to settle it!
As I said at the beginning, I'm no top-level player (yet?). I didn't know about things like war happiness until recently and I was long past the conquest stage by that time.
I also vanquished all my opponents entirely. I could have left the scientific tribes with one city to speed my science a bit. Still, that's only a free tech (or maybe a few free techs), and likely one or more of them would have little value.
And then there's the Scientific Leader screw up.
FWIW, I was a Monarchy the entire game. So chalk one up for the blue-bloods! As Chamnix has said in his SID thread, I'm just more comfortable in playing that way. Maybe more was possible on a change to Communism, but who knows. Republic may in fact be the government of choice for HOF histo games, but I think my game (and hopefully Chamnix's) will prove once and for all that Monarchy is a fine choice as well. At the very least, I think this proves that neither choice is a clear cut favourite over the other.
Many thanks go out to Moonsinger (Mapfinder) and ainwood (CAII) for their invaluable utilities. As for improving my game-play, if you're an Emperor or higher level player who posts here with some regularity, there's a good chance I've learned something from you. In fact, some of you would be surprised that I printed a hardcopy of your thread because it was so informative. As Isaac Newton said, "If I have seen further it is only by standing on the shoulders of Giants." So thank you...
While I take some pride in that accomplishment, I realize that:1. A huge histographic game is a major committment (six months in my case) so there's a relatively small number of submissions for this type of game.
2. Given that committment, most of the higher level players would be unlikely to revisit the lower difficulty levels to try and better their score.
3. Much that is known today about game mechanics, utilities and other "best practices" was not available to HOF entrants from the past.
I still don't consider myself to play at a high level and six months ago I'm certain I was worse. So I didn't keep any records of my progress to teach others how to play. This is my post-mortum account as best as I can remember it and it's meant for Emperor-or-lower level players. It's also important to note that the strategy for any high score histo attempt is very dependant on the difficulty level. These ideas worked fine for Emperor but are likely to be less than optimal for other levels.
Set-up
The standard warm, wet, 5 billion archipelago which is typical for many histo attempts. I will play as the Iroquois, which are a favoured choice for HOF games. For opponents, I chose America, Inca, Russia, Sumeria, Ottomans, Persia, Germany and Babylon. These are all the scientific tribes who don't start with Alphabet plus I chose America and Inca (with culturally-linked start locations) so I could hopefully be near two tribes who knew Masonry so I could trade for it early with a view to hand-building the Pyramids.
I used sedentary barbs which is useful in two ways:
1. At this level, it's reasonably likely to pop a settler.
2. The tech pace at Emperor seemed too slow for my liking for a really high scoring game.
The downside is that the gov't slingshots aren't likely to work as you lessen your chances of being the first to discover Philosophy. Having huts on meant that it was especially important that I could trade for Masonry very early while I still had something to offer.
Mapfinder found a 4448 limit with a one-cow start which seemed ideal.
The Early Game
With no huts, I typically build a settler first, and then a granary for a settler factory. With huts on, however, my strategy was to pop a settler for my second city so that the capital could begin work on the granary sooner and get the factory up and running. I went worker-granary as my first two builds because I needed a second worker to pop the huts.
Several maps were abandoned when my strategy didn't work. Finally I was able to pop one and founded my second city in 3250BC. IIRC, I chopped one forest so by 3250BC, I had two cities, two workers and a settler factory that was at or near completion. That's only 15 turns into the game! The early game is vital to everything that follows and my next 500+ turns were all beneficiaries of these early accomplishments. Much to my dismay, I then noticed in CAII that I hadn't selected Scientific Leaders. Anyway, I wasn't gonna abandon this great start so I carried on (they're optional for a HOF submission).
The Remainder of the QSC Stage
The second city immediately started a pre-build for the Pyramids which was completed in 1300BC. By 1000BC, I had 18 cities, 134 shields toward the ToA and 114 shields in another pre-build which became the Statue of Zeus ten turns later. I had also made four contacts and the slingshot didn't work as I suspected. Too late on Philo with the huts being on. I'd do that differently next time and wouldn't even try for it. Math was due in three turns and then I self-researched Monarchy.
The First War
I was ready for my first battle in 230BC. I had a "force" of four veteran (5/5) ancient cavalry and seven catapults on the American border. I triggered my Golden Age and began the first assault.
I'm a big believer in an early GA for huge histo games. The timing of my GA meshed nicely with running out of land for expansion. Another map would have allowed for more peaceful growth.
You have a period of rapid growth via the settler factory(s) followed immediately by another period of rapid growth during your GA. From then on, the game is won and you've also maxed out your score to this stage. In my case that's about 135 turns (to ~150AD) where there's little else I could have done to maximize my score. That's one-quarter of the entire game. The ToA was hand-built in 470BC which further improved my score. Additionally, I had been maximizing the number of happy faces since the start.
Here's a look at the state of affairs just before I begin my GA:
http://[URL=http://s639.photobucket.com/albums/uu120/dr1w/?action=view¤t=GoldenAge230BC.jpg]
[/URL]The Second Quarter - 150AD to 1400AD
Again, the goal is to maximize score. To do that, we'll have to take territory by force to reach the domination limit ASAP. At this level, you should have achieved domination by the end of the second quarter. I don't have a lot of game saves during this period because it's just your typical warring type events and I wasn't really planning on doing the type of play-by-play commentary that I find so entertaining (see Chamnix current SID game). Suffice it to say that I reached the DL around 1350AD-1380AD.
There's one thing I tried which really didn't work which is the 512 city trick. Essentially, you ICS to try and get to maximum cities (512) ASAP. That prevents the AI from building any more cities. Well, by the time I accomplished that goal, I was on the verge of wiping out my second last opponent anyway. The final opponent was Persia, on a smallish island, backward with about 10 cities. I was wiping him out before he settled any bothersome colonies on small islands. So in hindsight, I'd say it was hardly worth devoting any effort towards it. Still, I imagine all those cities helped me in other ways.
The third and fourth quarters are simply milking to improve score. Here's an interesting screenshot of where I did an outstanding job on my border expansions.
http://[URL=http://s639.photobucket.com/albums/uu120/dr1w/?action=view¤t=borderexpansion.jpg]
[/URL]Notice that in all this rocky terrain, I'm using only one hill tile. Another good tip is that you can sometimes grab an extra single tile with a border expansion to the third level (i.e. beyond 100 culture points). Have a look at city ">100 Culture?". By letting this city expand past 100 culture points, I was able to grab a single floodplains tile without also expanding into a mountain tile.
Anyway, that part of the game is mildly amusing. The rest of the milking stage is rather tiresome. I have no doubt that I could have placed a city here or there to make an extra few points, but I don't think it amounts to much.
Things I Could Have (or You Could!) Do Better
While the high DL was nice, I have three big continents which made for a lot of island hopping. Keldr has a nice Emperor level game going with a DL almost as good as mine but he's got a virtual pangea despite it being an archipelago. Such a map lends itself to reaching the DL faster. Plus I only had Pyramids on one continent, JS Bach's was on another, etc. This worked to my detriment.
The top three Emperor level games prior to mine were all pangeas with DL's around 4000 or less as I recall. In my mind, that couldn't stand up to a vitual pangea at 4250+. So in my post-game analysis, I'd say that you really want a pangea-like map, even if it means a slightly lower DL. Be forewarned however, that you'd devote a lot of time to a game before you really knew for sure how many continents you're dealing with.
As I said earlier, I've seen lots of other maps where more peaceful expansion is possible, but it wasn't in the cards for me on this one. That probably hurt my score, but since I was a warrior nation, it didn't affect me as much. I don't think being Mayan would have worked well on this map. I have started a new DG game as the Iroquois again, but I can now see how it would actually favour being Mayan. I have lots of vacant land at 250AD, but it's taking me forever to settle it!
As I said at the beginning, I'm no top-level player (yet?). I didn't know about things like war happiness until recently and I was long past the conquest stage by that time.
I also vanquished all my opponents entirely. I could have left the scientific tribes with one city to speed my science a bit. Still, that's only a free tech (or maybe a few free techs), and likely one or more of them would have little value.
And then there's the Scientific Leader screw up.
FWIW, I was a Monarchy the entire game. So chalk one up for the blue-bloods! As Chamnix has said in his SID thread, I'm just more comfortable in playing that way. Maybe more was possible on a change to Communism, but who knows. Republic may in fact be the government of choice for HOF histo games, but I think my game (and hopefully Chamnix's) will prove once and for all that Monarchy is a fine choice as well. At the very least, I think this proves that neither choice is a clear cut favourite over the other.
Many thanks go out to Moonsinger (Mapfinder) and ainwood (CAII) for their invaluable utilities. As for improving my game-play, if you're an Emperor or higher level player who posts here with some regularity, there's a good chance I've learned something from you. In fact, some of you would be surprised that I printed a hardcopy of your thread because it was so informative. As Isaac Newton said, "If I have seen further it is only by standing on the shoulders of Giants." So thank you...
- fast, good upgrade path, defense 2 for putting in armies. One problem is the amount of jungle you're likely to have on a milk map, but depending on where you start, the 3MC may be obsolete anyway by the time you reach jungle. Too bad the Hittites aren't agricultural.
