Choeimok
Spreading the confusion
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2011
- Messages
- 210
Do you hold some fond memories of those glorious pioneering efforts and want to share some anecdotes of these games?
Myself, I remember them all. Some vaguely, some precisely. I played my first game on Settler with Mansa on a fairly big lakes map. I had no idea what I was doing - think I settled my first city straight into the Tundra, got one or two cities razed by barbarians, got declared on unprepared by Monty, was unaware that you could stack units and generally lost cities all the time - just to win Time shortly before getting over the Domination limit in 2050
A few games later, I did actually have some basic ideas about the most basic of mechanics - vague knowledge about what food and hammers do, that was enough for Chieftain. Genghis on a huge earthlike Tectonics map on Marathon (and I actually started vaguely in Mongolia), that one was sluggy. There were lots of wars, especially with my northern neighbor Mehmed and I eventually took out some AIs with Trebs. Crawled to Biology, suddenly all these brown cities settled thousands of years ago that had been useless so far became good and I think I just rolled over the rest of the backward world with tanks. Noticeably harder than the Settler game
After some Chieftain games, I started to read on some advice and picked Willem on an Archipelago for an easy first Warlord win. Another Huge/Marathon map. I was "good" enough to know I could use the GLH but lost to Augustus. I lost my third city to the Hun event, still an easy win, way over 25 cities without a fight (though I think I stole one city from Monty and made quick peace). Then SB declared on me and I took out one AI after another with Industrial stuff.
Noble - the level where neither AI nor human are at an advantage (except for unit upgrades, of course). Sounds scary, and I actually managed to lose a game or two here first by making waaay too long-term plans. In the end, it actually was Montezuma that got me my first win. I took out neighboring Charlie with Jaguars (I think he lacked metals, so it was just Jaguars, at least one more with Rifles and yet again won a military victory. Around here, I finally stopped playing Huge/Marathon games and turned over to Standard/Standard.
Next came Prince. Oddly, it yet again was an AGG Leader that led me to victory here, this time Ragnar. Continents map, I got Maces before my only neighbor Izzy got Feudalism so I took her out. Then teched Astro, fought some easy wars and won my first Diplomation.
I did not stay there for long and went on to Monarch, this one was a NC game as Zara. I messed up an axe rush against Hannibal but choked him in his last city, settled my and his land with nice help from Zara's traits and eventually took him out. This was new for me, often I just thought "my rush failed, this game is lost" Caught up in tech and the rest was a renaissance/industrial walkover iirc. Again, some kind of miltary victory.
After a two years break, Emperor was the first difficulty to have me struggle at first since noble. I got RQ-Dan-Quaile'd a bunch of perfectly winnable games in a row - messing up a rush, losing a city to barbs, declared unprepared in late Renaissance so another AI was going to win culture, not whipping my offshore city enough in a defensive intercontinental classical war, boxed in at 4 cities with Alex plotting against me (nobody else bordered him) at Pleased. (Only NC Joao is looking good and far from lost, but I'm playing it as a - for my standards - high effort game and didn't feel like even trying to optimize things today). All silly on their own, but for my next game, I accidentally selected a small map size. Round team battleground, so basically a balanced Pangaea. Rolled Sitting Bull. Elephants in BFC. Settled one commerce city and one desolate plains cow short-term production city with (otherwise useless) grassland copper in the desert and reached Construction. The AIs were really odd in this one, Stalin already had 7 cities and soon settled an eighth. I took out 3 of his cities including Moscow, got a ceasefire, regrouped, killed the stack he had by now and took him out (though 2 cities were taken by his religion and warmonger buddy Napoleon who stabbed him). Around that point I noticed Huayna Capac and Charlemagne both were still at one city
So I took them out with my Elepult army and Nappy was the only AI left. I was standing before Paris, he still didn't have Feudalism at 1200 AD, a city came out of revolt and I got a border pop somewhere else, Domination. I had been constantly bleeding gold at 0% since halfway through the Stalin war, stopped teching after Construction, Currency and CoL, never researched Sailing, Alphabet or Aesthetics, even my core cities hated my guts from whipping and WE... and won my first game on emperor, and with Sitting Bull, too. Granted, it was an easy map, but... Then again, a lot of things were just playing in hand. Elephants, PHI getting me the 3 classical era key techs in time, not much land to settle while my neighbor went rexing crazy, the other AIs being so underdeveloped... Hell, even the Dogs were useful as stack defenders against the occasional Spear. While I did have some strike near the end, I probably could have gotten my economy back on its feet by building cottages and wealth... but watching the world burn was more fun. It's somewhat ironic, the games where I tried to play well I lost, this one was just "Elepult you, Elepult you, Elepult you and Elep- oh, I already won", I wasn't even trying. It's not the level of Duelling Gandhi, but it does feel like a cheesy win... 
Immortal and Deity are still missing, but some day...
I think it's odd that I won military victories in so many of these games here, usually I just go Space. Yet not a single space victory under my first ones. The leaders also strike me as odd, only 2 actually/debatably good ones in here (I don't think I can count Mansa, I really had no idea what I was doing...), lots of AGG and PRO...
Myself, I remember them all. Some vaguely, some precisely. I played my first game on Settler with Mansa on a fairly big lakes map. I had no idea what I was doing - think I settled my first city straight into the Tundra, got one or two cities razed by barbarians, got declared on unprepared by Monty, was unaware that you could stack units and generally lost cities all the time - just to win Time shortly before getting over the Domination limit in 2050
A few games later, I did actually have some basic ideas about the most basic of mechanics - vague knowledge about what food and hammers do, that was enough for Chieftain. Genghis on a huge earthlike Tectonics map on Marathon (and I actually started vaguely in Mongolia), that one was sluggy. There were lots of wars, especially with my northern neighbor Mehmed and I eventually took out some AIs with Trebs. Crawled to Biology, suddenly all these brown cities settled thousands of years ago that had been useless so far became good and I think I just rolled over the rest of the backward world with tanks. Noticeably harder than the Settler game
After some Chieftain games, I started to read on some advice and picked Willem on an Archipelago for an easy first Warlord win. Another Huge/Marathon map. I was "good" enough to know I could use the GLH but lost to Augustus. I lost my third city to the Hun event, still an easy win, way over 25 cities without a fight (though I think I stole one city from Monty and made quick peace). Then SB declared on me and I took out one AI after another with Industrial stuff.
Noble - the level where neither AI nor human are at an advantage (except for unit upgrades, of course). Sounds scary, and I actually managed to lose a game or two here first by making waaay too long-term plans. In the end, it actually was Montezuma that got me my first win. I took out neighboring Charlie with Jaguars (I think he lacked metals, so it was just Jaguars, at least one more with Rifles and yet again won a military victory. Around here, I finally stopped playing Huge/Marathon games and turned over to Standard/Standard.
Next came Prince. Oddly, it yet again was an AGG Leader that led me to victory here, this time Ragnar. Continents map, I got Maces before my only neighbor Izzy got Feudalism so I took her out. Then teched Astro, fought some easy wars and won my first Diplomation.
I did not stay there for long and went on to Monarch, this one was a NC game as Zara. I messed up an axe rush against Hannibal but choked him in his last city, settled my and his land with nice help from Zara's traits and eventually took him out. This was new for me, often I just thought "my rush failed, this game is lost" Caught up in tech and the rest was a renaissance/industrial walkover iirc. Again, some kind of miltary victory.
After a two years break, Emperor was the first difficulty to have me struggle at first since noble. I got RQ-Dan-Quaile'd a bunch of perfectly winnable games in a row - messing up a rush, losing a city to barbs, declared unprepared in late Renaissance so another AI was going to win culture, not whipping my offshore city enough in a defensive intercontinental classical war, boxed in at 4 cities with Alex plotting against me (nobody else bordered him) at Pleased. (Only NC Joao is looking good and far from lost, but I'm playing it as a - for my standards - high effort game and didn't feel like even trying to optimize things today). All silly on their own, but for my next game, I accidentally selected a small map size. Round team battleground, so basically a balanced Pangaea. Rolled Sitting Bull. Elephants in BFC. Settled one commerce city and one desolate plains cow short-term production city with (otherwise useless) grassland copper in the desert and reached Construction. The AIs were really odd in this one, Stalin already had 7 cities and soon settled an eighth. I took out 3 of his cities including Moscow, got a ceasefire, regrouped, killed the stack he had by now and took him out (though 2 cities were taken by his religion and warmonger buddy Napoleon who stabbed him). Around that point I noticed Huayna Capac and Charlemagne both were still at one city
So I took them out with my Elepult army and Nappy was the only AI left. I was standing before Paris, he still didn't have Feudalism at 1200 AD, a city came out of revolt and I got a border pop somewhere else, Domination. I had been constantly bleeding gold at 0% since halfway through the Stalin war, stopped teching after Construction, Currency and CoL, never researched Sailing, Alphabet or Aesthetics, even my core cities hated my guts from whipping and WE... and won my first game on emperor, and with Sitting Bull, too. Granted, it was an easy map, but... Then again, a lot of things were just playing in hand. Elephants, PHI getting me the 3 classical era key techs in time, not much land to settle while my neighbor went rexing crazy, the other AIs being so underdeveloped... Hell, even the Dogs were useful as stack defenders against the occasional Spear. While I did have some strike near the end, I probably could have gotten my economy back on its feet by building cottages and wealth... but watching the world burn was more fun. It's somewhat ironic, the games where I tried to play well I lost, this one was just "Elepult you, Elepult you, Elepult you and Elep- oh, I already won", I wasn't even trying. It's not the level of Duelling Gandhi, but it does feel like a cheesy win... Immortal and Deity are still missing, but some day...
I think it's odd that I won military victories in so many of these games here, usually I just go Space. Yet not a single space victory under my first ones. The leaders also strike me as odd, only 2 actually/debatably good ones in here (I don't think I can count Mansa, I really had no idea what I was doing...), lots of AGG and PRO...
"I can use Workers and convert all those Forrests into units" :roftl: "No, seriously, this is too easy" 
.
). It took one loss to win prince, and three to Monarch.
