[BNW] Enjoyable Deity Games

[Nizef]

Here is a recap of the games in the Enjoyable Deity Games Experience (EDGE) series so far in 2020, (games from last year are listed on page 9 of this thread):
42. the Mayans 2 (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), Piety challenge
43. Siam (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), Patronage partial challenge
44. the Shoshone 2 (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
45. Poland 2 (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), Honor challenge
46. the Netherlands (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), Liberty challenge
47. the Aztecs 3 (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
48. the Celts (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
49. the Zulus (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), Aesthetics challenge
50. Austria (Pangaea, Epic speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
51. Persia (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
52. the Ottomans (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), Religion challenge
53. Rome (Fractal, Epic speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
54. Songhai (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
55. the Incas (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
56. Russia 2 (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
57. India 2 (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), CV challenge
58. Germany 3 (Pangaea, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded)
59. Byzantium 2 (Fractal, Standard speed, Standard size, Unmodded), Religion challenge

 

[Nizef]

EDGE#60: The last in line, Aesthetics challenge
I continued to listen to Dio and here it fits the theme even better than in the previous game. The Iroquois is the last civ to appear in this series, not because I would have anything against them, but I rarely play them. This is mostly due to the fact that I don´t get their bonuses. The Longhouse is kind of nice but the UA only, in practice, saves you a little bit on road maintenance costs and the window of opportunity for the UU is very limited on Standard speed. After my struggle with Theodora, I rolled this superb starting location with Hiawatha on only the fifth attempt. It is a YASS with a good combination of forests, river and hills. You are also starting on a peninsula with good defensive positions, more or less ideal for peaceful play. The AIs are entertaining themselves with countless wars, so this should be easy, right? Well, it isn´t! For starters, the peninsula is shy on Strategic Resources and there will be other twists and turns as well. Anyway, you play on an unmodded Pangaea map with Standard size and Standard speed. QC and QM are turned on and all VCs are enabled as usual. The self-imposed rule is to fill out the Aesthetics tree. Enjoy!

I played my own game in accordance to HOF rules and also submitted my painful win. There is a short recap in the spoiler.

Spoiler :

Settled across the river on the hill and picked up two more Salt tiles and then Scoutx2-Shrine-Archer-Granary-Settlerx2. Last religion (Earth Mother/Tithe/Asceticism/Religious Art/IP). I stole one worker from Milan and cleared a couple of barb camps for additional workers. First expand coastal to the NE on the Cocoa, second expand to the SW next to Lake Victoria and the third (crappy) expand to hook up the Spices. Oracle on t80 and 4 city NC on t88 and I reached Education on t108. I should probably have forwardsettled England to get the nice Cotton/Wine spot.

I had a nice midgame and hard built Sistine, Uffizi and the Louvre. I was third to Renaissance and first to Archeology. I got 14 Antiquity sites and a couple of landmarks as well. As you can see, I went all-in for a CV. But with only four cities, it was somewhat slow to get the techs. The countless AI wars meant that I could pull slightly ahead, but really only slightly! Then we come to this with SR: the peninsula is a triple zero (no Coal - no Aluminium - no Oil). Before I could buy Coal both Washington and Pacal went Order. I picked third and went Freedom. I was not afraid of the Ideology pressure, but I was (rightly so) concerned with the political implications of my decision. Ramesses and the tiny England (down to 1 offshore city) went Freedom as well, Venice took Authocracy (I mean, really??) and the rest of the pack took Order.

The endgame was a tight race between my Culture and Washington´s spaceship. America also had an enormous culture output, and I needed to overcome almost 100.000 culture to win! Right after t310, when I was sure of winning, the UN decided to embargo America. I could not stop it either because Enrico was running the UN and he bought back all the CS I managed to influence. Furthermore, Washington did not like me, so I could not get open borders with him. I managed to overturn it on the next vote on t332 and after that it took 10 turns and 5 GMus to win. Rarely have I had such a twist in the late game. All in all a very nerve-wrecking game and I am happy that I won it in the first place. I stayed out of all wars (but sponsored 10-15 wars) but it would probably have been better to be more aggressive and at least take some english cities instead of letting the Incas have them. Very complicated and demanding!. SP: full Tradition, full Aesthetics, Exploration 3, Patronage opener, full Rationalism and Freedom 8.

 

[Tiberiu]

Hello Nizef, I have been following your posts since I joined the forum. The Byzantium challange 59 caught my interest and I started playing the map. Didn't really know what to expect as I never played fractal before and I also usually play huge size maps, mostly for there to be 7 competing religions instead of just 5. Tech costs and happiness from cities having different values also slightly affect gameplay especially early game, but I adapted and right now in T97 I am almost first in scores and decided to end the first session after finally enhancing my religion and seeing a major war about to erupt. Weirdly enough, for the first time in Deity play I built Mausoleum of Helicarnassus, which I normally wouldn't even consider. Also built Artemis and Pyramids but those more common. I will post the results after I finish the game. I wanted to thank you for providing these challanges and I am a fan of unique challanges myself and I am looking for things like these. Also, nice insight about Iroquois, which in my opinion can be more dependent on the start location, unlike other civs. I can't help but feel that they are slightly underpowered if the map isn't forested enough. Cheers!

 

[Nizef]

Hello Nizef, I have been following your posts since I joined the forum. The Byzantium challange 59 caught my interest and I started playing the map. Didn't really know what to expect as I never played fractal before and I also usually play huge size maps, mostly for there to be 7 competing religions instead of just 5. Tech costs and happiness from cities having different values also slightly affect gameplay especially early game, but I adapted and right now in T97 I am almost first in scores and decided to end the first session after finally enhancing my religion and seeing a major war about to erupt. Weirdly enough, for the first time in Deity play I built Mausoleum of Helicarnassus, which I normally wouldn't even consider. Also built Artemis and Pyramids but those more common. I will post the results after I finish the game. I wanted to thank you for providing these challanges and I am a fan of unique challanges myself and I am looking for things like these. Also, nice insight about Iroquois, which in my opinion can be more dependent on the start location, unlike other civs. I can't help but feel that they are slightly underpowered if the map isn't forested enough. Cheers!

Thank you. Feedback is always appriciated and I am happy that you liked it. So far, my understanding is that most Deity players on this forum like Pangaea/Standard/Standard, so that is why I usually stick to it as well (even if I put out a game with Epic speed every now and then). Just one question: how often do you build ToA (Artemis)? For me it is crazy difficult to build it on Deity!

 

[mbbcam]

In all the years I've been playing Civ5 I've never played anything larger than a standard map because my computer even struggles with that in the late game. And as it takes me about a week to play a standard speed game, I would never consider playing anything slower. As it is, I usually get bored by about T150-T200 and stop for a while. I then can't remember what I was doing, so I start a new game. We're all different! But yes, Pangaea/Continents/Standard/Standard has always seemed to be the preferred choice in this part of the forums. Most of the guides seem to have been written with that in mind.

 

[Nizef]

EDGE#61: Scoring goals with B17s, DomV challenge
Here you play on an unmodded Pangaea map with Standard size and Epic speed. QC and QM are turned on and all VCs are enabled as usual. The landmass has roughly the shape of a goal (you know two posts and one crossbar) and hence my headline. Furthermore, I am missing all the football (soccer) and icehockey series that normally run this time of the year. Anyway, you play as Washington and here you have the chance to play domination the way I like to do it: building and being patient in the early game and then when you feel ready for it - score all the "goals" in a short period of time. You have all the space you need for a nice early game and also otherwise I am sure that you will like this one. The self-imposed rule is to play for a domination victory and to build and use at least one B17. Enjoy!

I played my own game in accordance to HOF rules and also submitted my win. There is a short recap in the spoiler.

Spoiler :

Settled on t1 on the Copper hill. Then Scoutx2-Shrine-Archer-Settlerx2. First religion (Stone Circles/Tithe/Pagodas/Plowshares/Messiah). I stole 2 workers from a CS, 1 from Indonesia and 1 from England. 3 expands, so 4 city NC on about t115. Then I built HG on t128 and reached Education t160. Cities were growing nicely, and I liked all this room to expand!

I had a nice midgame and hard built Sistine and PT. After PT on t285 I finally declared war on Indonesia and with my Artillery they went down in a few turns. On t314 I already conquered London. I left Songhai for the moment and went for Dido instead, the reason being that she and Maria were the strongest AIs on this map. Carthage fell on t348. Picked Order as my Ideology.

The endgame was about clearing the map. I kept a pause to get the Atomic/Information era units. But then I hit the road again: Gao on t404, Cusco on t426 and then the Grande Finale with XComs on t435, taking both Venice and Lisbon at the same time. I had 7 promoted B17s and they were just fantastic! Very enjoyable game indeed. One of my personal favourites! SP: full Tradition, Exploration opener, full Rationalism and Order 8.

 

[Tiberiu]

Just one question: how often do you build ToA (Artemis)? For me it is crazy difficult to build it on Deity!

I am a big fan of the Temple of Artemis! I will try to give you a more elaborate answer on this question and give a few comments as I have experimented with it quite a lot with it. I am aware that ToA has a reputation that it is hard to be built but to be honest I don't understand why. The most basic requirement is having 2 forests, and even that isn't vital if other things go well (luck with ruins, or succes in stealing a worker, or good dirt). In a way, a more important question is if the opportunity cost of building ToA is worth doing it, than if it can be done.

Assuming no bonuses (no ruins found, no workers stolen), in a normal case scenario that has capital on a hill with acces to 2 food 1 prod tile and a hill and 2 forests, ToA can be done with 2 citizens in turn 28. (depending on whether the worker must move into forest or cut immediately and on whether Archery is finished 1 turn faster by meeting enough civs quickly, I am sure it can be done in 27 and possibly in 26 if both apply. Worst case scenario has turn time at 35 (non-hill capital, a 2 food tile and a 2 prod tile and 2 forests). This also implies that Archery is immediately taken and monument will be built and Liberty will be taken for the worker. Also, this means that finding ruins that help (tech Archery, or give culture, and stealing a worker are basically 100% chance to build ToA if you want to, because AI's will not start the production of a Wonder until they have at least 4-5 citizen. (this is my insight, I can't prove it but this seems to be like it.) AI's also have a discount that is around 20% for Wonders despite common misconception that they don't. (this can be seen in-game via a spy). In my games ToA gets done at turn 35+ if I do not build it. Of course, if the AI was not poor at playing Civ 5, building ToA would be literally impossible...

Also, I would like to add one more extra tip because it's non-trivial. It has helped me get Wonders that I would have lost plenty of times. : Say if there is Egypt near me and I see him building a wonder I want, one option is to declare war vs him, this usually makes them switch to produce more units, giving more time to finish it.

The question now becomes if it's worth doing it, and I would like to say that this is just my opinion and experience from the games I play, for what it's worth.
For me, teching Archery instead of Pottery means that I am willing to potentially sacrifice getting a religion (if I rely on Shrine to found one), OR, that I will try to get a religion by Liberty finisher (free prophet) , OR, that I will get one via Natural Wonder. This also implies that a pantheon will still be founded in time before it expires. I usually get a religion via Liberty anyway, so building ToA has no real important downsides. I estimate that the investment will more than pay for itself during the game, as the 10% of ToA is a 10% of the total food and not only of the excess food, like 10% of Fertility Rites is. More or less, it's 4-5 times more powerful than Fertility Rites if my math is correct. Especially in coastal starts, ToA becomes more desireable because of how powerful sea food routes can be.

The thing is, sometimes I think that an early pantheon can be stronger overall, for example in jungle starts trying to rush Sacred Path pantheon, or in desert starts, trying to rush Desert Folklore. In tundra starts trying to rush Dance of Aurora is third case.
I would make an estimate that I consider ToA desireable to be built in around 40% of the games , and in those cases it's pretty much always buildable as long as there are 2 forests. Rarely, I might abandon the plan to construct it just after finishing Archery if an important reason came up (for example I discovered a great Natural Wonder and I decide to get a settler instead). Building Archery for no reason hurts the game a bit, though.

Cheers! Going to continue my game, man this is really cool game! I have a really food intense religion now and also Artemis, giving 10% fertility rites, 10% ToA, 15% SiP, Feed the World. if I manage to get tradition finished I'll get crazy food especially during we love the king turns

 

[Nizef]

Thanks for teaching me how to do it! I tried it right away and got it on t29 on the first attempt - despite settling on t1 on flatland and loosing 1 additional turn by choosing to research Pottery instead of Archery for one turn (before realizing that my "Tradition autopilot" was not supposed to be turned on). BO was Scout-Scout-ToA. I was lucky with an early pop ruin and having a nearby neighbour who was willing to "donate" one of his workers to me.

I do believe that better players than me will have an absolute blast of a game with Byzantium#59. Enjoy the ride!

 

[Nizef]

EDGE#62: Big dreams in peaceful times
Even if the crazy things in life have to be virtual these days (thanks to the Corona virus), it is still beneficial to try something slightly less mainstream. When I (and probably most other players as well) play Sweden, I usually get the tundra bias screaming in my face but once in a while there will be something different. If you recall EDGE#28 where we got a jungle start, this is also a quite unique start with Sweden. You play on an unmodded Pangaea map with Standard size and Standard speed. QC and QM are turned on and all VCs are enabled as usual. The self-imposed rule is to build Petra! Just as a hint, you are not the only one with a desert start. You will have to have the wonder completed before t70 to have a chance to get it. However, there are also some hidden advantages with this one. Enjoy!

I rage quit my first game (lost Petra by 2 turns). There is a short recap of my second attempt in the spoiler.

Spoiler :

Settled t1 on the Gold to the S. I got the 500 g for finding El Dorado. First expand to the S on the Gold two tiles from the Ivory. Second expand near El Dorado for Spices and Cocoa and third expand to the E to hook up the Dyes. I beelined hard to get Petra and got it on t69 (screw you Assyria). However, I lost out on a religion. Assyria took DF and Religious Idols was not strong enough. Stockholm was going to be fantastic but the expands were average at best. Late NC on t95 and Education on t113. I was worried about Portugals intentions.

The midgame was about catching up as I was second to last into Renaissance and only fifth to Industrial on t170. I wanted to use my production for a smooth SV. I was third to Ideologies and second to pick Order after the Mayans. Uneventful midgame, but I built more military than normally and I suspect that was enough to keep Maria off my borders.

The endgame was a normal SV routine and being allies with 6-7 CS was a nice bonus. I launched on t298 after a totally peaceful game. I wonder what a more warlike game would have looked like? The potential was there. However, I figured that Venice was more useful as a trading partner than as a victim. I rushed through the endgame, since this was not a HOF run and thus I made a lot of sloppy decisions. SP: full Tradition, Patronage 2, full Rationalism and Order 8.

 

[raider980]

I'm playing the India and Byzantium games. As mbbcam said, I usually don't finish games because there comes a point where I get bored. Its obvious what is going to happen or I'm so far behind that there's no point. Plus, the exploring the map and founding cities is my favorite part. So I've started many of these Edge games but not finished them. Especially where the starts look so good; like the recent America and Sweden ones. For America I'm going to move north one and settle on the copper. And for Sweden I'll move south and settle on the gold. Maybe that will allow me to buy some stuff instead of building it so I can focus on Petra. Although I'm not sure the best route to take to get Petra; I suppose beeline Currency, but I guess you still need to get writing for a library and mining for those hills.

I am continuing the India game, its T225 and somehow I'm first in science, not sure how that happened. I will go for culture but not sure if I can do it. I may have to fall back to the standard science win. And the Byzantium game is very fun right now. I expect to lose rapidly though because I did something that is probably the nail in my coffin but I had to do it.

Spoiler Theodora game :

William attacked me with tons of troops, luckily they were just warriors and archers. Dromon are awesome - I was able to build them in two turns and they were instrumental in protecting my city firing up the Dutch troops. Only bad thing is they upgrade to Caravel (why?). Then Suleiman attacked William. I was going to go for Amsterdam because it was a pretty nice city and William had attacked me. So both the Suleiman and I were attacking Amsterdam. I tried to time it but Suleiman got it with one last spearman. I knew if Suleiman were able to keep that city he would win the game easily, he had already conquered some Assyrian cities. I looked at diplomacy and darn, I had a DoF with him. But I couldn't let him keep that city, so since I was still in range, I attacked him. I took Amsterdam and killed most of his troops but now the world hates me. Oh well, time to go on a rampage.

 

[Nizef]

EDGE#63: Small dreams in the land of the inland seas
As many of you may know, Finland has the nickname " the land of the thousand lakes". More accurately there are about 168.000 lakes of the size of at least 5.000 m2 including lake Saimaa, the fourth largest lake in Europe. This map is nowhere close to that but there are several inland seas (especially if one also count seas that are bordering the polar ice). You are playing as Morocco on an unmodded Pangaea map with Standard size and Standard speed. QC and QM are turned on and all VCs are enabled as usual. The self-imposed rule is to take at least two points in Commerce. The start is ordinary but not weak. In my game it felt okay, but maybe it is a little shy on growth. Make sure that you settle near Mt. Sinai, perhaps not for the faith but for the tiles in the vicinity! Enjoy!

I played my game in accordance to HOF rules and submitted my win. There is a short recap of it in the spoiler.

Spoiler :

Settled t1 across the river on the desert hill. First expand to the E, three tiles from Sinai and the second expand to the N to hook up the Citrus (in the third ring not to settle too close to Gao). Ruins were Barbs-Culture-Pop-Map-Gold-Culture. 3 city NC on t84 and I settled coastal near the Copper for my fourth city afterwards. I missed out on Sinai but still got a really good religion (second or third): DF/TIthe/Pagodas/Plowshares/Holy Order. In the late game I recieved 35-40 gpt from Tithe and 70 fpt. My strategy for this game was to achieve a SV and this religion helped out extremely well. After buying the GS and GE I needed to win, I still had 1800 faith left over! Askia had a bad time and was conqured early by Suleiman. The Ottomans had several other neighbours, so keeping them busy was not very hard at all. Education quite late, t116.

I was sixth to Renaissance but second to Industrial. I only built BB and I also went for PT, but Enrico built it three turns before I would have completed it. I was first to pick an Ideology and picked Order. England was building all the cultural wonders so I beelined for Radio and rushed Eiffel, just in case. As it turned out, there was nothing to worry about: Arabia, Carthage and England all went Order as well, In a way the game was already decided when England picked Order.

In the late game I attacked the rampant Suleiman together with Theodora, Dido and Harun. I took Gao as my fifth city, liberated Taghaza and burnt one minor city to the ground. After that the Ottomans were no threat at all, even if they stole Dynamite from me just as the war broke out. Nice war all in all! After that I focused on my spaceship and won on t304. SP: full Tradition, Commerce 2, full Rationalism and Order 6. City pop were 29-21-21-21-15 at the end.

 

[Nizef]

I'm playing the India and Byzantium games. As mbbcam said, I usually don't finish games because there comes a point where I get bored. Its obvious what is going to happen or I'm so far behind that there's no point. Plus, the exploring the map and founding cities is my favorite part. So I've started many of these Edge games but not finished them. Especially where the starts look so good; like the recent America and Sweden ones. For America I'm going to move north one and settle on the copper. And for Sweden I'll move south and settle on the gold. Maybe that will allow me to buy some stuff instead of building it so I can focus on Petra. Although I'm not sure the best route to take to get Petra; I suppose beeline Currency, but I guess you still need to get writing for a library and mining for those hills.

I am continuing the India game, its T225 and somehow I'm first in science, not sure how that happened. I will go for culture but not sure if I can do it. I may have to fall back to the standard science win. And the Byzantium game is very fun right now. I expect to lose rapidly though because I did something that is probably the nail in my coffin but I had to do it.

I think many of us agree on the early game being the most exciting part of civ5. However, sometimes late game wars are also incredibly exciting as in EDGE#62 for example. Also, I think it is very satisfying to actually achive a victory, even if the road there is not always the most exciting.

About CV in the India game: better players may have a different view, but 1) I most certainly need either Uffizi or Louvre to pull off a CV, 2) I need to be first to Archeology (or among the first) to secure 10+ artifacts and then of course 3) it is required to build the guilds very early and actually work them for most of the game. Early Hermitage will also help. After doing the preparations in the midgame, it is "only" to tech for Hotels/Airports/NVC/Internet and you will win eventually (remember the bonuses for Diplomats/Trade routes/Open borders). A tourism output of 550-600 after Internet will almost always be enough combined with 3-5 GMus. If I can do it this way, you will most certainly be able to pull it off as well. (Sorry, if this was old news to you. Btw. I used GotM160 as my training ground to learn how to do it and ended up playing the same map many times. I think that India#57 has the same potential!)

In the Byzantium game I think you can get away with it, because the internal trade routes are well protected and you will pull ahead in techs of the AIs at some point. I hope that you manage it to the sweet end! And thanks for trying out the maps!

 

[Tiberiu]

Finally, I finished my Byzantine game! It was a great game and I had fun especially in the first part of the game. I made quite a few mistakes and I also kept switching plans, failing to focus on a single victory type.

Spoiler Spoilers about my game :

Summary:

4 - city Liberty game - Win turn 305 cultural victory

The final statistics are somewhat decent for a 4 city empire but in hindsight 6 cities or more would have been better for such a rich map.

tourism +1276 / culture +1606 / science +1411 / hap +47 / faith +174

16 wonders built: Temple of Artemis / Pyramids / Mausoleum of Helicarnassus / Leaning Tower of Pisa / Sistine Chapel / Taj Mahal / Porcelain Tower / Eiffel Tower / Statue of Liberty / Broadway / Cristo Redentor / Brandenburg Gate / Sydney Opera House / Big Ben / CN Tower / Neuschwanstein

13 other wonders conquered. (captured Venice capital, India capital, Austria capital).

Only 1 civilization remains (Assyria).

How it went:

The early game went great thanks to the rich start location. Right when I was going to settle my 5th city, Kyzyl allied one of my enemies (India and Austria kept switching allaince with them), and they captured my settler. They almost managed to threaten to capture one of my cities, but a few Dromons proved decisive in defending.
Securing Kyzyl as ally was the hardest challange early game.

Another war was raging on the right part of the map with India and Austria which went in a common war against me, but they just kept sending units to their doom, and I was successful in crippling them both and denying them any hopes of victory.

Mid game, The Netherlands proved to be a tough nut to crack, and going to war with them was a thankless task. Despite their civilization not standing the test of time, they were the only civilization which inflicted non-trivial casualties to my empire.
The Netherlands were faster in expanding in a rich area near the sea, and I had the brillant idea of letting them stay there in order to farm sea beggars in the Renaissance Era. The idea was good, the implementation bad, as they reached Navigation quicker then expected and at a bad time for my warring empire. Attacking Sea Beggars with Galleas and a privateer was premature. During the course of 20-30 turns of war I lost an estimated 25.000 worth of production in sea trade routes, improvements and fleet but recovered most of the losses later as I captured a lot of free boats from them.
Another major setback was failing to get control of the World Congress in order to pass meaningfull things that would help win faster.

After upgrading Voluntary army to Infantry, William stopped being relevant in the game and I simply demanded open borders from him when I wanted to instead of paying for it. I was hoping he gets destroyed by The Ottomans so that I can bring him back to life for extra votes in the World Leader, but he didn't and I had to take him out later. Uthrecht fell only after the arrival of the Battleships.

Late game was mostly Sim City because being tech leader I could pretty much do whatever I want. I decided to send the Voluntary Army to fight a war against The Carthage and the Ottomans, and to attempt to liberate Kiev, but it proved to be too hard and I was forced to retreat.

On the other part of my empire, the war against Indians was a major success, and he was being completely wiped out by a fortified citadel. Only 15 turns later he offered to surrender, and I accepted. Mumbai was taken as tribute and razed to the ground.

Spoiler Spoilers about my game :

Final Screen:

 

[Nizef]

It feels like you had an enjoyable game, Tiberiu! You managed 37 SP and filled out four trees entirely! Wow! I also enjoyed your write up and the pictures. Very well done! Thank you for sharing.

 

[Nizef]

EDGE#64: Brexit re-engineered
I chose this headline, not to provoke a political debate but to describe what I did in this game. The idea being, that instead of leaving an union, I was incorporating some key cities into my own empire. As you already have guessed, here we are playing as England on an unmodded Fractal map with Standard size and Standard speed. QC and QM are turned on and all VCs are enabled as usual. The self-imposed rule is to host the United Nations at the end of the game. However, this does not mean that you have to win a DipV, you just have to have more votes than any AI. The starting location is fantastic (absolutely OP), since it is a coastal start with Salt and Gold and you have good defensive terrain to the N for a blocker city or two. If you have Fractal allergy, do not worry. You will start on the main continent with just one AI missing. The last AI can conveniently be discovered by teching Sailing (no need for Astronomy). Most AIs on this map are usually doing well on Deity. It doesn't get any better with England than this. Ever. Enjoy!

I played my game in accordance to HOF rules and submitted my win. There is a short recap of it in the spoiler.

Spoiler :

SIP and then Scoutx2-Shrine-Settler-Archer-Settlerx2. I stole 2 Workers from Persia and 2 from a CS. First expand to secure Salomon (right in the mountain pass) and Sugar, second also to the N to hook up the coastal Silver and the third to the S for all that Salt. I built the Oracle before NC and thus NC was on t94 and Education on t114. Interesting set of AIs: Arabia, Assyria, Denmark, Egypt, Germany, Persia and Portugal.

When I finally got the cargo ships up and running internal trade routes, I was catching up fast. I was fifth or sixth to Renaissance but second to Industrial and clear leader to Modern. Bismarck built the PT so no more wonders for me before building Eiffel and Broadway. Both Egypt and Arabia had huge culture output, so I needed to build up my own culture pool as well. Longbows are ridiculous and I took Persepolis and Ecbatana in the midgame. That secured me a very strong position for the rest of the game. Not even the fact that I was first to Ideologies and picked the shunned Order meant anything. Actually 3 AIs went Freedom and 3 took Autocracy (and Portugal was conquered long before this). That way, I had to counter 40 unhappiness for the remainder of the game. With the help of some CS and taking all happiness policies in Order, this was not even hard, and I ended the game on +32 happiness despite having -40 from Ideology pressure. I definitely liked this game! In the early midgame I also did something I rarely do: Assyria was conquering Portugal and attacking Berlin. I was afraid that Assyria would get out of hand and paid them to make peace. Much to my surprise Germany recovered well (not Portugal though) and was fighting Assyria on equal terms for the rest of the game.

In the late game I did a "boring" SV routine and won comfortably on t295. Egypt and Arabia had equally impressive Culture, so neither of them were going to win. Bismarck was only 4-5 techs behind at the end, but my win was uncontested. I was running the UN with the help of 7 CS. I actually proposed Order as World Ideology three times even if I knew it would not pass. It costed me in AI relationships but I did not want to risk that they would have passed an other Ideology. Offensive defense so to speak. Right at the death, I attacked Pasargadae to use my Atomic bombs for something and took the city in two turns just for fun. Bye, bye Darius! SP: full Tradition, Patronage 2, full Rationalism and Order 8. City pop were 34-23-21-19-15-13-4 at the end. Very enjoyable game, but anything else would have been a shame with such a start!

 

[Tiberiu]

It feels like you had an enjoyable game, Tiberiu! You managed 37 SP and filled out four trees entirely! Wow! I also enjoyed your write up and the pictures. Very well done! Thank you for sharing.

Thank you! It sure was good game. I think I didn't correctly place the spoiler insertion in that post, I will try to edit. Sorry if I made any mistakes.

Now I tried your EDGE#62 with Sweden and I am embarrased to admit that I failed it.

Spoiler :

(failed petra) I failed on first attempt despite game going well due to a personal unforced mistake... Petra went on turn 68 in my game.
Just to prove to myself that I could have done it I rolled back a save in turn 41 and made few improvements and this time <I> did it in t68, weird enough, but with better focus it can clearly be built a bit faster. The challange is lost though, because I am a purist and feel bad if I play knowing I used any cheat and that includes reload or map knowledge. As a side comment, for obvious reasons this challange is very doable but to me it still feels a bit forced to build Petra. In fact I never built it before so I have no experience with it on Diety. In a hard-try game I wouldn't even try to build it, seems too risky and the opportunity costs seem too high, in my opinion. I will have to continue unofficialy my game with Sweden though, just to see the power of the city and how it affects the gameplay.

To boost my morale I would like to play the hardest challange that you have available and win it. For this I would like to ask you what is the one you would recommend or consider to be the most difficult?
Also, I would like to ask you if I can share a start to this thread, I have two starts that were very enjoyable. Both no mods and standard settings and speed, one is Standard size with Portugal, Continents and the interesting thing in it is that there is a certain AI in the game with OP dirt who is sure to get runaway status really quickly, making a win extra challanging. The second one is with Spain, but it is Huge size, Pangaea, and it is one of the best starts that I have had in my games. At start of game you have in sight 3 salt, 2 deer, 1 wheat, 1 whales, 4-5forests, with your settler both on river and near coast. Your starting area is a combination of plains-tundra (mostly tundra).

 

[Nizef]

Hi Tiberiu,

Nobody has asked before to upload into this series, but I am happy that you would like to contribute. I would like to set some rules for uploading:
1. I would like that you ask before you upload (just as you did),
2. use the next available EDGE#numbering (65 at the moment),
3. Write a short introduction of what we are facing and any additional tasks (policies etc),
4. write behind a spoiler how your own game went,
5. upload a jpg-file of the starting location (are you familiar with an awesome site called png2jpg.com?) and obviously also
6. upload the inital starting file.
I am sorry for being a little bit picky here, but I think that a certain order will come in handy if more people would like to upload games. The Portugal game fits very well and I also think that your Spain game will add some variety to the thread. I have not uploaded huge maps myself, because (just like mbbcam) my computer is not handling huge maps very well, but sharing great games is in itself okay. It is anyway up to readers, if they like to try out a certain map or not.

Your other question is tricky to answer. The initial idea behind this thread was to upload Deity games that are perhaps a little bit easier than the average game. If nothing else, they usually have good starting positions. However, I would like to list a few games that are a little bit special:
1. EDGE#42 with the Mayans is probably the hardest game in this series. I failed it and better players than me, have also failed it. Only vadalaz has mastered it as far as I know, and he is of course one of the best players in the world.
2. EDGE#35 with the Aztecs uses Hellblazer´s Pangaea map script but is otherwise unmodded. Doing a SV is quite easy there but the idea is to win a DomV. I am not sure if others have tried it or not, but I found it crazy hard because several AIs play well on the map.
3-4. EDGE#4 with Denmark and EDGE#52 with the Ottomans are harder than average because the starting positions are rough.
5. EDGE#60 with the Iroquois is not that easy either (at least not for me).
6. I can´t help myself, but I would like to take the opportunity to promote EDGE#20 (also on Hellblazer´s Pangaea) with Babylon. It is one of the easier tasks in the series but I just love that map and the idea that you have to colonize the nearby islands to get your game going. You could perhaps also have a look at EDGE#6 with Germany or EDGE#15 with Venice.

Nizef

 

[Tiberiu]

I think I will give #42 a shot, I like Maya and piety doesn't scare me especially with their UB. Thanks for the permission to post this challange in your thread. I will share the Portugal game.

EDGE#65. Four's a crowd. Portugal, no mods, standard settings and speed, Continents map. QM can be turned on in options if you like to use it. The start is quite good, offering both high food and decent production potential, with a long river that can prove very useful against would-be invaders. The map offers riches to those bold enough to seek them out, but when too many people consider those riches destined to be theirs, peace can become fragile. We are facing a world where some are more blessed than others; there are 3 continents on this map, and yours is the most crowded. While you deal with envious neighbours in unfateful wars, others can use their isolation to make faster progress. Are you up to the task of not letting that happen?
The self imposed rule, as the headline suggests, is to be the one who eliminates a civilization from your starting continent from the game. You freely choose when and how. (it doesn't count if somebody gets eliminated by somebody else!)
As a final tip, a certain Natural Wonder is in the game and finding it could make your game very smooth.
Enjoy and good luck!

Spoiler Spoiler about my game :

I played my game quite some time ago but I remembered it well because it was the closest game to lose because of an AI winning culturally. (Persia). I chose not to SIP and went for the sugar near the Cattle instead, not only to save time to get the sugar but to immediately get the 3 food tile. This proved to be inspired as now the capital would later have Marble. My exploration was not very lucky as I chose a route that left El Dorado to be discovered by the Iroquois. I decided early that I can't be friends with Napoleon, fearing that he would become dangerous if he expanded towards me, and my early game was based on the idea to take him out so I researched Archery and crippled him with just warriors and archers. It was going to be the Zulus who took him out eventually, and I seized the opportuinity to then attack the Iroquois too. It was going to be much later that I eliminated them from the game. I expanded only on the coast in order to be able to build Nau in all cities later if I want to and for Exploration to be powerful, and then focused on Science. I wasn't sure of Nau's effectiveness, but I made decent gold with several of them by using their ability near the Maya. I concentrated on securing as many CS alliances as I could, taking Patronage after first completing Liberty and making Coups when having at least 75% chance. It paid off despite also having 2 failures that costed a lot of money to then recover influence. Having concentrated on the early war with France and then the Iroquois, I didn't get a religion and didn't build any early wonders, that privilege would go to the Maya and Persia, who were both engaged in wonder whoring. Shaka was paid to be at war with somebody else and when we clashed I couldn't make progress towards his cities. I managed to barely win this game because Persia became too powerful and I didn't keep him in check early enough. I managed to win a Diplomatic Victory in the end in T306, using a brought back to life France's votes and the other city states as allies. Also managed to pass World Ideology (Freedom) and also won World Fair with 2 writer bulbing at the end to help me counter Persia's high Tourism. SP: Liberty 6 Patronage 3 Exploration 4 Freedom 7 Rationalism 4

 

[Nizef]

EDGE#66: The insignificant fishing village at the end of the world that stunned us all
This is like a salute to Tiberiu for uploading his first game and funnily enough Bucharest is absolutely instrumental in this game! The starting location is average at best and the first four luxuries that you will have to hook up are Pearls, Marble, Dyes and Truffles. No synergy whatsoever. And don´t get me started on the neighbours, well I guess it could have been Shaka but it is bad enough as it is. On the bright side you can have a dominant religion if you want to. I had a painfully slow start but came the last part of the game at supersonic pace. Very interesting game and definitely not too easy. Here we are playing as Egypt on an unmodded Pangaea map with Standard size and Standard speed. QC and QM are turned on and all VCs are enabled as usual. Enjoy the first (250) painful turns! He-he.

I played my game in accordance to HOF rules and submitted my win. There is a short recap of it in the spoiler.

Spoiler :

Moved one tile to the N to get an Observatory in my cap and then Scout-Shrine-Granary-Settler-Archer-Settler-Scout. I stole 2 Workers from England and 1 from a CS. First expand to secure Mt. Sinai, second coastal to the S for the Dyes and more Pearls. Then I let them grow a little before I settled a fourth city to the E between the Truffles and the Gems and rush bought a library. First religion with TotG/Tithe/Pagodas/Plowshares/IP. NC on t102 and Education on t122. Was this lost already here? Not really, because the AIs were fighting a lot and I actually never met two of them before they were wiped out!

When I finally got the cargo ships up and running internal trade routes, I was catching up. But I was still last to Renaissance by a mile and third to Industrial and actually only third to Atomic! Religion was no priority for the AIs in this game and the last one went approx on t150! I built Sistine, Louvre, PT and also Eiffel. Annoyingly I could not get many artifacts - the curse of being late to the party. Askia was plotting against me all the time but I diverted his efforts towards England and Carthage. Eventually we both picked Order and were happy buddies until the end of times. Bucharest was a priority ally for me since they had Coal, Oil and Uranium! Oil was no issue but both Coal and Uranium had to come from them. Morocco had a tough time and England was the third AI to get wiped out. That left us with Songhai, Assyria and Carthage. Nothing can go wrong in a neighbourhood like that, can it? They were happy to fight each other though.

I entered Atomic as late as t260, but I had saved all my GS (but the first one) and during the next 30 turns I bulbed 14 of them (2 from HST, 1 from Order, 1 from PT, 7 from cities and 3 from my religion). I built three spaceship parts and used 3 GE (one from Order and two from my religion). I also rushed Eiffel and HST with GEs. This was a prime example of what a great religion can do for you! In addition to all that faith I also got 80 gpt from my religion that had spread to 20 cities! Askia had his own religion but he could not hold it in more than a couple of his own cities. I won on t297. SP: full Tradition, Piety 2, Exploration opener, full Rationalism and Order 8. City pop were 31-23-21-17 at the end. Satisfying end to a rough game!

 

[Tiberiu]

Short report on #42

Spoiler T102 :

The settling decision was hard but in the end I move away from the river and on the hill losing the hydrocentral but unknowingly getting marble, at least. I discovered Fountain of Youth early but wasn't fast enough to settle it and instead will have to eliminate Brazil in order to secure it. I founded my religion in Uxmal, a city founded to the south near Brazil's capital, not only to make it unrazable but in order to put pressure on more cities. I managed to build Hanging Gardens, Oracle and Hagia Sophia and I have obtained Sacred Sites Reformation belief while having Mosques and Monasteries as Follower Beliefs so I am already Tourism leader. The game is going along nicely, as I have 2 friends - Venice and Inca. Early game I declared war on England, Indonesia, Brazil, and Carthage, and now with a catapult soon ready and soon obtaining Iron to upgrade the Warrior, I am ready to take out Brazil. The game should evolve quite nicely. My main setback in this game was my failure to obtain workers early enough, and having no access to Liberty (besides the Piety rule I took Tradition to open Hanging Gardens and Honor to go to war, they improve things slowly. I can already see that only Inca can pose problems in this game as the rest are not doing really well. I have a domination victory in mind right now but we'll see how it goes.