G-Major 15

[ParadigmShifter]

Bah, lost that game. It was going so well until I decided to bribe Bismarck into attacking Kublai Khan who I was about to take out anyway to try and weaken Bismarck's navy. When I went on the attack against Khan I left his old capital (with Stonehenge, Pyramids and some other wonder) too lightly defended, so Khan took it back. Took the 2 cities I was heading towards and was about to retake Khan's capital when he vassalized to Bismarck, leaving me back in my 3 cities of Khan now reduced to 1 tile each. That sort of ruined the game for me with all my CR3 grenadiers trapped in Khan's land and Bismarck had destroyers by then so I couldn't redeclare on Khan and now Bismarck until I got them too.

Evenally went for space instead, to try and get my first Emeror win. Was heading for Fibre Optics to build internet (had competed Apollo and built labs, had aluminium, done several casings and nearly finished thrusters), but then I had to sabotage Incan and Spanish engine parts but failed and ran out of money, quit in 1902 when Capac was just the stasis chamber away from he win. Was catching up too had great production in Ironworks city and a couple of others. Bah. Still took hours to play the game even at quick speed.

Attempt 7 coming up I think.

EDIT: Also hampered by no-one except Capac wanting to trade techs with me due to WFYABTA. And I only managed to trade 1 tech for 3 with Capac. I had Asoka and Julius as vassals but even when I got Asoka up to friendly he still didn't want to trade, I thought being friendly gets over the WFYABTA limit, apparently not. Time to do some research on this forum I think.

The game went alot better than my previous attempts anyway, Great Library and first to liberalism to get Nationalism plus having already researched gunpowder and music was a big bonus. Only managed to vassalize Julius with cavalry though (had already vassalized Asoka). I should probably have finished him off but war weariness was a problem.

Next time, I won't bribe the bloke I want to attack next into helping me in my current war anyway. Bismarck vassalizing Khan really was the nail in the coffin for this game. I should have gone straight for Bismarck I think but he had about 5 frigates lurkking near his coal city. I'd managed to get Julius' coal anyway in a vassal demand so I could have just built up a stronger navy instead of tryng to finish Khan off (both he and Bismarck had coal and I didn't hence my motives for attacking), or I should have done it on my own with no help from Bismarck who promptly leapt into 1st place in the score. I was firmly in 4th place the rest of the game. Had I vassalized Khan instead (he didn't want that though, I did check the turn he vassalized to Bismarck) I would have still been land leader at around 24% I think. And Bismarck and Churchill were nice juicy targets up next as well, Bismarck before he had Panzers and Churchill after I had Infantry (post-redcoats).

I think I stayed in Nationalism a teeny bit too long too before switching to Emancipation/Free Speech/Universal Suffrage. Aslo, I didn't build Oxford University early enough I don't think and building it in the capital which could only run 3 specialists was probably a bad idea. I had a good GP farm site available but since National Epic was in the capital it was under-used. Only the capital produced any GP. I should probably have built the National Epic a bit later than I did when I had more cities.

EDIT2: State property though, yeah!!! I haven't really used this civic before since I am normally well in the lead when going for a space win. I think I will use it a lot more often in future.

 

[The-Hawk]

Thought I'd try this. I picked Hatty, figured I would research AH, spam war chariots and go for a quick blitz. After one try, I'm not sure that will work, you just can't be that fast. By far, the biggest challenge with this gauntlet is quick speed. Warmongers like marathon .

I think I'll try again with praets... they have a little more staying power. Yeesh, probably will need to build an economy along the way too .

 

[The-Hawk]

When in doubt, go with Praets.

My second try was with Julius on Vanilla. Domination victory in 1810 AD.

Very difficult to do this on quick speed... the tech pace makes it hard to maintain a tech advantage with your military. Units become obsolete very quickly, so you have to tech the whole time.

In a couple of recent Immortal large map military games I just submitted, I was able to turn off research after CoL/Contruction and go wire-to-wire with Praets/Cats. I thought that might work since this is a standard sized map (smaller maps are much easier to dominate early), but the quick game speed more than makes up for the smaller map. Immortal/Large was easier than this because of quick vs. marathon.

I ended up needing to invade one island to get to the dom limit (my original "snakey continent" was about 100 tiles short). However, as I had long since teched through Astronomy, this really wasn't a problem.

This was the first time in a long while that I built infantry.

 

[FiveAces]

Very difficult to do this on quick speed... the tech pace makes it hard to maintain a tech advantage with your military. Units become obsolete very quickly, so you have to tech the whole time.

Try using Cold instead of Temperate or Tropical and don't put Mansa in the game. It really slows the AI teching down. You can still be first to Lib after 1200 for example.

 

[kovacsflo]

I play with Qin Shi in vanilla. Both financial and industrial are really useful in this game where you must build at least oracle and G Lighthouse. Later wonders can be built easier even without ind.

Now the date is 965 AD and I am about 10 turns away from cavalries. I already have a pretty good army with knights, cats, maces and some grenadiers. I almost totally destroy Huayna. Separated leaders don't have yet longbows!

 

[killercane]

Cyrus and Ghengis have both worked well for me. Im really wondering if lots of early pure settling with an IMP civ, blocking the AI off as much as possible, and a mid to late UU wouldnt give you the fastest victory.

 

[KMadCandy]

EDIT: Also hampered by no-one except Capac wanting to trade techs with me due to WFYABTA. And I only managed to trade 1 tech for 3 with Capac. I had Asoka and Julius as vassals but even when I got Asoka up to friendly he still didn't want to trade, I thought being friendly gets over the WFYABTA limit, apparently not. Time to do some research on this forum I think.

it does but vassals change the definition of friendly. if you have vassals, you and your vassals count as a "team" for tech trade purposes (even tho you don't auto-share techs the way true PA-teams do, go figure).

for an AI to count as friendly with you for WFYABTA, he has to be friendly with your team, not just you. that also counts for tech trades within your own team -- since you had asoka and JC both as vassals, asoka has to be friendly with both you and JC for him to be officially "friendly so WFYABTA doesn't count", regardless of how much the diplo screen says he likes you. you can actually end up with someone telling you "we will never trade with you, our worst enemy" while the same screen is telling you his attitude is Pleased towards you, if you have enough vassals that he considers vile ! oh so intuitive. more details here

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Hey I know KMad, you answered the question in the thread I started in Strategy and Tips on this subject (WFYABTA and friendly), since no-one reads the major threads unless they are participating I guess. What do you want, bonus points or something ? You are already at the +4 "You gave us help" modifier from me so as long as you don't get some vassals, sign a defensive pact with MobBoss or nuke me you are safe for the forum diplomatic win.

 

[KMadCandy]

*giggle* oops! the question comes up a lot so i answer it when i can, because chances that you'll figure out the answer by searching the civilopedia or diplo screen itself are <99.9%. i don't keep track of who i answer it for

since no-one reads the major threads unless they are participating I guess.

i do, but i'm an oddball naturally!

 

[kovacsflo]

There is still just one submission in this gauntlet when just 10 days left. I was on holiday for some days and that's why I couldn't submit mine, where I have 35% territory in about 1460, and I don't have an idea will it be enough for a good result.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

I'm still trying this gauntlet for my first emperor win. Quick speed makes it pretty tricky. Trying Augustus at the moment.

 

[Dracandross]

Blaah I won't even bother. It is too likely that there will be only one submission in addition to one any other player could make. Therefore first gets 100% points and second gets 5%. Or with even 3 risk to be last is huge.

Not worth the effort as the scoring really blows if only few can even complete the challenge (Not that Id be sure Id get this one but even less idea to try).

-Dracandross

 

[killercane]

Blaah I won't even bother. It is too likely that there will be only one submission in addition to one any other player could make. Therefore first gets 100% points and second gets 5%. Or with even 3 risk to be last is huge.

Not worth the effort as the scoring really blows if only few can even complete the challenge (Not that Id be sure Id get this one but even less idea to try).

-Dracandross

Well I will definitely submit one, I played a few of these to varying lengths. It seems I always end up thinking that I can do better, and have several saved games past 1000 AD. The normal gameplan is CS sling, build GLibrary+academy+national epic in capital, be on the way to eliminating at least the second civ by 1000 AD, build a boatload of horse archers for upgrade, turn off research at Mil Trad/Guns, bulb chemistry, and work towards cannons.

 

[Methos]

Therefore first gets 100% points and second gets 5%.

Actually, it would earn 10%.

 

[The-Hawk]

Not worth the effort as the scoring really blows if only few can even complete the challenge (Not that Id be sure Id get this one but even less idea to try).

Actually, this became my motivation. If only a few can complete the challenge, then all the more reason to try. I'd be very happy to come in second out of only two on a major gauntlet. Seems like quite an accomplishment. In this case, I don't care so much about the low QScore, I take my satisfaction in finishing a tough gauntlet.

 

[shyuhe]

I'm definitely going to give this gauntlet a try but I'm still trying to figure out the map configurations. I've tried generating a few high sea snaky continent maps but they don't look very good. Even though the land is less, maybe it's better to go with medium sea levels? Any thoughts?

 

[The-Hawk]

IIRC, I took someone's suggestion about using low sea level. I wanted as many land tiles as possible on my main island, and I wanted to be able to reach other islands via galleys. Didn't actually work this way, I needed galleons to reach the one foreign island I needed to conquer. If I had it to do again, I would still take low though...

 

[Dracandross]

You have valid point on that if you are on table that has just few games its a noticeable job indeed. Still I'll feel that it would take about 20 tries to complete it (as harbourboy had in last one, eww) and that is too much. I definitely play so few games that I have to look for improving QS too. Just whining so that scoring could be changed a bit.

-Dracandross

 

[Alan_of_Dale]

When in doubt, go with Praets.

My second try was with Julius on Vanilla. Domination victory in 1810 AD.

Nice job, and still the only victor after nine days!

I tried this twice so far IIRC with high sea level to hold back the AIs. May try again with low sea level. Possibly Vanilla this time instead although Augustus is nice with Creative. Haven't decided yet.

 

[killercane]

Finally finished. 1635 w/ Liz. Map wasnt great, just a gold, fish, clams and cow w/ not much production in the capital. However 3 excellent production sites nearby and ivory allowed for an early start on conquering w/ several 1 turn elephant spots. Cavalry in 800 AD is a little late, but the AI was exceptionally slow and at war with one another. I saw no rifles for the first time playing this gauntlet , the others only made it to Constitution. Screenshots are of before the cavalry storm and the final result.

Its fairly easy to get Mil Tradition via Liberalism around 450 AD, and Gunpowder within 5-6 turns after that. Just keep on the Nationalism path after hitting the CS slingshot/Alphabet and bulb Paper->Education and if you can, Philosophy.

The Inca are usually the AI monster, being the only financial civ around. In this game they had a bad tundra start. In other games they get to Rifles by 1200 AD!