G-Major 100

[Habitus]

Terra seems like one of the better options to help avoid tripping Domination over Conquest.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Or set the BUFFY land domination limit to 5% or 10% and raze cities when over.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I think PA cheese might come into play again .

The hardest thing about ancient in this format IMO is preventing distance AI from winning a cultural victory.

Still I think you could get a decent finish time on something like pangaea or terra by letting a nearby AI get utterly huge, PA it, then use it to chain cap. Alternatively one can tech it up themselves although the production on deity might be hard to match on normal speed huge .

 

[bhavv]

IMO, the conditions for this one make Tokugawa sound like a top tier leader

 

[Manco Capac]

I think PA cheese might come into play again .

The hardest thing about ancient in this format IMO is preventing distance AI from winning a cultural victory.

Still I think you could get a decent finish time on something like pangaea or terra by letting a nearby AI get utterly huge, PA it, then use it to chain cap. Alternatively one can tech it up themselves although the production on deity might be hard to match on normal speed huge .

Wouldn't be the largest AI be the top in score, then refusing a PA for being a top dog?

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Wouldn't be the largest AI be the top in score, then refusing a PA for being a top dog?

I've not run into much trouble with this TBH. I think power and other factors matter too.

The 1850 time I posted a month or two ago was my 2nd attempt. Even if it's not the most powerful AI at the time of declaration, it's amazing what 20 warrior + cata gifts and actual intelligent tech prioritization (and trade control) can do for an AI . It's one of the most blunt instruments in civ, but it's still a powerful tool. Someone would have to play extremely well to get a better result from more "standard" approaches, whereas PA abuse isn't so hard .

 

[Manco Capac]

Someone would have to play extremely well to get a better result from more "standard" approaches, whereas PA abuse isn't so hard .

Some people including you were talking about Rusten's quick cossack large map game and it looks like a powerful leader and civ for mass conquest. Nonetheless, Rusten himself mentioned something obscure like his SSE would only work best on quick speed...

Still, the raging barb enable option changes the early game quite much depending the map type. Thus different opening on deity means we have to accept the chosen path, which may not help super early cossacks/rifles.

Anyways, I will to chew over this better later; too busy right now with challenger series.

 

[Kaitzilla]

It probably blew up my chances of a top 3 the challenger series since I'm going on vacation soon and after that the Succession Game starts, but I had to try this one.

The raging barbs were a real head scratcher as they kept destroying my capital on turn 15-17. Eventually, I found that a map with 17 AI on high seas-pangea with a cold climate crowded them out to some degree. I also settled on an ideal stone hill with 2 wet corn and a pig. The great wall helped me more with early infiltrations and extra great generals than barb control.



I might post about how my game went later if it gets accepted. But for now, Julius Caesar says the time to beat on this one is 1505AD.

 

[shulec]

You are the man Kaitzilla! Too bad about the break from civ for vacation. I was looking forward to Kaitzilla vs. Tachy in the Challenger series.

Do more civs help keep the AIs' armies weak? I am thinking Hatty is the best AI for this. I hope I get some time for this after finishing the challenger series.

 

[Manco Capac]

Do more civs help keep the AIs' armies weak? I am thinking Hatty is the best AI for this. I hope I get some time for this after finishing the challenger series.

The last time (long time ago) I squeezed the AI's to a point they had minimal cities (on immortal or deity whatever), they were all tech monsters.

Kaitzilla's sure has extreme skills with preats! Man...that date looks so hard, especially after trying Duckweed's challenge (with Julius preats too) in S&T subforum where I got results that seemed good even for deity players (except Mylene as usual...) and I only took down two civs by 680 AD. Man! How do you do that, Kai!?

EDIT: Kaitzilla, you should blow'em up on that challenge to proove HoF players aren't a bunch of idiots as THEY think!

 

[Kaitzilla]

You are the man Kaitzilla! Too bad about the break from civ for vacation. I was looking forward to Kaitzilla vs. Tachy in the Challenger series.

Do more civs help keep the AIs' armies weak? I am thinking Hatty is the best AI for this. I hope I get some time for this after finishing the challenger series.

17 AI does keep the army size down on pangea until an opponent gains some vassals. I don't recall fighting any single army that had more than 30 units in it.

However, the diplomacy is very hard to keep track of. I was constantly under DOW threat from many sides. Having a high power rating helps tremendously here, and that is mostly about not losing units in fights. (Something the Praets are good at, along with having total superiority outside of cities for a long time)




I didn't rush with Praets, but attacked when I could revolt cities and hit them with catapults first. This was around 500BC I think. AI cities develop much faster than the player can develop theirs, so waiting before taking them is kind of useful.

I would not have done nearly as well without the early Great Spy from the Great Wall. Also, Oracling a tech to trade helped immensely.




No strategy really stands out but to focus on an espionage economy, and getting vassals to research the techs you want after you give them their capital back.

Also, if possible, try to let the cities your vassal keeps be the ones between you and a potential opponent. If there is another thing vassals excel at doing besides teching for you, it is filling their cities with tons of defenders. Just keep gifting them the latest military techs, and the next Ghenghis Khan who backstabs you will have quite the fun time chewing through your Deity vassal to get to you.

I'm carrying on, but the best way to get an enemy to become your vassal is to find their stack of doom and kill it without taking any losses. The French vassalized to me this way before I could take even one of their cities.

 

[Manco Capac]

I didn't rush with Praets, but attacked when I could revolt cities and hit them with catapults first. This was around 500BC I think. AI cities develop much faster than the player can develop theirs, so waiting before taking them is kind of useful.


I'm carrying on, but the best way to get an enemy to become your vassal is to find their stack of doom and kill it without taking any losses. The French vassalized to me this way before I could take even one of their cities.

I will keep that in mind; try to control my urges to kill asap is often my achille's heel. I know doing very early agressions to the AI isn't always the best, but still falling into the same trap.

Killing a stack may be easier given outside a walled city; better war success.

Thanks for the summary.

 

[Kaitzilla]

The last time (long time ago) I squeezed the AI's to a point they had minimal cities (on immortal or deity whatever), they were all tech monsters.

Kaitzilla's sure has extreme skills with preats! Man...that date looks so hard, especially after trying Duckweed's challenge (with Julius preats too) in S&T subforum where I got results that seemed good even for deity players (except Mylene as usual...) and I only took down two civs by 680 AD. Man! How do you do that, Kai!?

EDIT: Kaitzilla, you should blow'em up on that challenge to proove HoF players aren't a bunch of idiots as THEY think!

I am certain that they do not think we are a bunch of idiots.

Not everyone enjoys the HOF rules, such as allowing Permanent Alliances or unlimited tries with handpicked starting locations and opponents. I don't see why any setting makes the game "better" or "worse" than any other. It is trying to finish as fast as possible that makes 95% of civ games interesting.

Most people realize on some level that they have "won" the game at a certain point and stop playing. Others realize that they have "lost" and stop playing when the situation is hopeless. If you play for speed, then you finish many more games with a lot more enjoyable strategizing


If nothing else, we may have converted TMIT from the Strategies and Tips forums to try some HOF games. As he has pointed out a few times, it isn't competing against the AI so much as it becomes competing against others, which is most of the fun of Xotm and Succession games. That is why I let a finish date slip in the Gauntlet sometimes, instead of letting it remain hidden.

 

[Bugio]

Congratulation Kaitzilla. Seems i picked the settings as you but so far no luck with it. With that crowded map, i found i can barely settle 3rd city. Need some luck with RNG, cause often there is no iron/horse there. Good tip in going for oracle a tech to backfill some techs. With that many AI the beaker and hammer invested really pay off.

As for HOF games, some people plays to beat the map, some plays to beat others PVP and others play to beat the score/record. They're all perfectly valid option, i enjoy the latter most. Since i started play games, those games hooked me, from pinball dreams to minesweeper (!) and snakes on my cellphone i enjoyed the competition with friends. Too bad i still need to learn a lot here to match the good ones

 

[ZPV]

Hehe. I'm playing radically different settings (Terra/Low Sea Level/11 civs/Flat) and probably won't be able to beat 1505 with them, but I'll be doing it with dramatically more than Praets.
It's definitely a learning experience, and I don't know how fast the mid-end game will go - I see it as a tech race more than anything else.

 

[bhavv]

Although I would never manage to beat a conquest Deity game with raging barbs, I've tried this out a few times.

On Pangea maps with cold / high seas, I could never get enough progress tech wise while fending off all those barbs in the early games leaving me too far behind.

On cold / high seas archipelago maps starting on my own Island with space for 7-8 cities, I still fall far too behind due to not having any tech trades.

Its a very hard and almost impossible challenge.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

If nothing else, we may have converted TMIT from the Strategies and Tips forums to try some HOF games.

What's this? I posted my first (and quite a few after that) game to HoF years before you officially joined the forum, just fyi

I never had the micro patience to truly be competitive (MOST of the time), but I've also never been the type that only shows up at one spot on the forum. I'm not playing much civ IV (though still some) lately but that's always cyclical for me.

When one makes an effort to improve, it always pays to be open-minded and possibly even cut-throat. My sub forum affiliation knows no loyalties .

 

[Manco Capac]

What's this? I posted my first (and quite a few after that) game to HoF years before you officially joined the forum, just fyi

Years? o_0

Unless you meant Kaitzilla was pretty taciturn in the past...I don't really get it.
Or you meant you were playing civ as a lurker before registering to the forums.

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Some people including you were talking about Rusten's quick cossack large map game and it looks like a powerful leader and civ for mass conquest. Nonetheless, Rusten himself mentioned something obscure like his SSE would only work best on quick speed...

After reading a certain almost irrelevant comment somewhere, I ended up to think it is all about the fact the innate beakers from super scientists and other super specialists are not scaled, giving a slight advantage to this type of economy on quick speed where techs cost lower.

I think I am still wrong, but it may be the reason.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

I might post about how my game went later if it gets accepted. But for now, Julius Caesar says the time to beat on this one is 1505AD.

Congratulations on an excellent date!

Why not Augustus? The Industrious trait will help build both The Great Wall and The Oracle faster with its +50% Hammer bonus for Wonders; good to have for National Wonders like Heroic Epic too. Half price Forges are almost as good as half price Courthouses, though the latter work better for a more Espionage focused game. The half price Forges will help build everything including Courthouses a bit faster. So between the two, Augustus and Julius Caesar, I'm not sure which one is better. Augustus is definitely better in getting The Great Wall up faster though, thus he would be best for surviving the Raging Barbarians in the early part of the Ancient Era.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[Coilean]

Just curious, is anyone trying ancient era starts having success doing anything besides rushing GW? I haven't been able to do anything which performs better than settle on stone, build 4-5 warriors while teching masonry, then build GW before finally building my first 2 workers while researching BW to try and whip/chop out the first settler and barracks. Even so, it seems I am facing longbows ~1AD on crowded maps, which pretty much permanently puts me out of the game with only 12-15 praets built by then.