G-Minor 183

[WastinTime]

Peter had a huge stack coming at me too. I may have enslaved some of his people while he was busy with his other neighbor. As soon as he ended that war, he was already in war-prep mode. I knew I was the target. I had to switch religions, and get Liz to Friendly so I could bribe her to DoW Peter. His stack immediately turned around. Then Fred dogpiled him and I never heard from him again. IIRC he was eventually wiped out completely. Mansa is also very good about attacking people if you bribe him.

 

[WastinTime]

Average attack Date of a Chariot-rush: Something like 2000 - 1500 BC.
Average AI-empire at that time: 4-6 cities, that have 2 Archers each = 8-12 Archers, some even behind Walls

Most cities will have 0% or 20% culture defense. Maybe a hill or two, but no walls.
In my game, all 6 DeGaulle cities were on flat land.

If you use 'no city razing' (which can sometimes hurt you a bit) then you can take new cities with 0% defense right away.

 

[Seraiel]

Just played a game on a way better map than my initial one. Start had Corn, Gold, Gems and Marble, 2nd city captured Stone, 3rd city had 5 FPs + wet Wheat, later heavy culture also captured Rice, Copper also available, so all Resources that are needed, or even those that are only nice to have.

Rexed first very fast to 3 cities (before 2000 BC) , then waited until I had Granaries and could whip, then rexed to 6 cities.

Research Agri -> Mining -> AH -> Writing -> Alphabet (trade for everything) -> very strange following via Math -> trade for CoL -> Philo GS-bulb -> Theo through trade -> CS through trade -> Education (also bulbed) -> Liberalism (100 BC, used for Nationalism) -> 100% culture -> PP (via REP) -> traded for Banking -> traded for Economics -> Constitution (via REP) -> Corporations -> tech xy +1 -> tech xy +2 -> tech xy +3 etc.

Missed Oracle Civil Service by 5T and on top, my early Library in the capital got destroyed by a random Event 2T before I would have gotten a GS.

Wonders: Mids, MoM, Parthenon, Sixtine

Cottaged L1 + L2, farmed all other cities, generated "only" 12 GAs.

L1: 1000 / turn thx 2 Hermitage
L2: 600 / turn
L-GP: 500 / turn

Number of Religions: 4

Guessing that the finish date won't please Jesusin .

 

[pomthom]

I was thinking of trying a last go at this but seeing the competition, who am I kidding

 

[ZPV]

I had a weird start, because of the food situation.

Athens founded 3975BC
Gold, Ivory, Grass-hill pig, Marble, Stone, 4 floodplains, 2 river grassland, 1 plains river. Plains hill start, non-coastal... and fish.

Because of the fish, I built a settler very early, and founded city 2 on the coast (with a clam too, and a couple of tiles' overlap) in 2825BC, to build a work boat for Athens.

Next, I researched up to Alphabet (delaying founding city #3 by a few turns to speed it up) in 2150BC

Then: legendary 2 (cottage city), foudned 2150BC (Grass hill sheep, 6 floodplains, grassland iron, and a few grassland rivers)
legendary 3 (GP farm), founded 1975BC (Dry corn, grass cow, 4 floodplains)

City #5 1650BC, with two food, and a bunch of production. I'd have made this a production-focused legendary city if I lost one of the other two sites, or if it didn't overlap production tiles with the capital so much.

Academy 1150BC
Mausoleum 700BC (I traded for Calendar)
Civil Service 525BC
Golden age (GP-fired) 470BC, to revolt to Buro+HR+Slavery+OR+Islam

City #6: filler, 365BC. Claims rice, but wasn't in time to get the copper spot (which I would later flip and keep).

Missed Music by 1 turn (350BC); built Parth+Sistine aroud this time. I lost Statue of Zeus.
I built Shwedagon Paya in Legendary 2, and regretted it as I always do.
110BC - Mansa builds AP in my religion.
I single-bulbed Education, and won Lib-Nat in 10AD
I didn't revolt right away, since I still had to whip a few temples. I also had to research Drama before firing up the culture slider.
145AD: Taj + revolt. I had three religions spread, plus a fourth in progress. I'd build a fifth set of cathedrals in the two cottage cities.
235AD: Revolt to Mercantilism
310AD: Copper city flips to me. Hello cheap cathedrals.
385AD: Trade for Printing Press.
20 turns to go: 2nd GP-fired Golden Age. This was probably worth it, since I was able to starve out GAs from most of my cities. I might briefly have been the population leader just before the starvation phase.
In the end, I built 14 cathedrals, had 14 towns (split 7-7), and 5 villages (1-4).
I culture bombed 0-5-7.

That last figure is why I regret building a second cottage city.
I didn't dare pop a late-game great person from it (it could have supplied one, but was full of icky Shwedagenes), and only needed 2GAs fewer than the GP farm.
Focusing harder on building and then GA production would have been at least as good, and probably a handful of turns better.

Current position: 2nd.

 

[Seraiel]

Very hard to understand why you regret having built a 2nd cottage city. From what I read, you've played a very GG, and mainly overtook me with building the Cathedrals faster and building less World-Wonders. At least that's what I suspect from reading the writeup, and that's something I guessed already when playing my game.

 

[WastinTime]

Nice results, between you and Seraiel, I'm convinced to going back to try more cottaging in culture games...at least in the capital...which I always did with FIN leaders. It's showing good results even without FIN.

However, I think there is untapped potential in the hammer/wonder strategy which I've used in a couple recent culture games. In this gauntlet, I only had 3 towns and 3 villages split between 2 cities. (still holding on to #1.)

 

[ZPV]

However, I think there is untapped potential in the hammer/wonder strategy which I've used in a couple recent culture games. In this gauntlet, I only had 3 towns and 3 villages split between 2 cities. (still holding on to #1.)

I agree with you, but I also struggle to find sites that have the food to run at high population, and enough base hammers to build wonders without an entire army of workers chopping.
edit: I mean, outside the capital
That said, shouldn't we have learnt the power of wonders when Bram kicked everyone's backsides all those years ago?

 

[WastinTime]

I agree with you, but I also struggle to find sites that have the food to run at high population, and enough base hammers to build wonders without an entire army of workers chopping.
edit: I mean, outside the capital
That said, shouldn't we have learnt the power of wonders when Bram kicked everyone's backsides all those years ago?

Years ago, pretty much only playing on Quick, I was obsessed with getting 20+ GArtists. They are stronger on quick speed. I never wanted to get those Shweddy parts and other contaminants in my gene pool. Wonders we're not the way to go in that situation.

Now I'm wondering if a Boreal map with 25+ forests/city would do some damage.

 

[jesusin]

I've chickened out, so mow I play with slow AIs.
Also I'm playing Stone starts now, since I can't research without cottages.

Both these things are errors, of course. All my pains would be easied if I had a GS ready to bulb Education. I *could* have had it this game. It would have saved some 10 turns (difficult to calculate).

I've improved my date another bit, but I'm sure I'm far from competition, not being first to Liberalism. My Liberalism date was 640AD.

Game notes follow:


In PH, Wheat, cow, stone, gold. Found Marble very far, settled there. 5 cities by 2000BC, +3gpt, 3Wor. 3religions. Alphabet is very hard to get with 1 single Gold. Should I delay my city settling? Alphabet gotten as late as 1500BC, I wasn't the first . So I don't get Mono, PH nor IW.

1000BC: 6 cities, 6Wor, Pyra, +10gpt, 4 religions.

Lost my chance to trade Aest, Drama for Theatres, trade for Maths, bulb Philo for my 5th reli. Darius went WTYHBTA too soon Tr away Philo for CoL+Curr+MC+Calen+Monar
OR, religion. Parthenon. First to Music by 2 turns, 300BC. MoM delays Sistine's a bit, but I get both. NE. CS quite late but I get Constr and Machi in return.

10AD: 6cities, 48pop, 8workers, 6units(6War), 4 strategic resources, 4 luxury resources, 4 health resources, 4 great persons, 4 world wonders, 1 national wonders, food/production/commerce=137-53-358, 135 bpt at breakeven, 132 culture per turn, 73 great person points per turn, 0 gold. 5 religions, 2/2 cottages used, 33Techs: Music, Paper, Machi, Drama, no Feud. 0 civs killed. x hours played. 22infections, 7tem,1cath.

I'd had won Musa to Liberalism, but I traded 1000g from Darius for Paper too soon and he got to Educ 5t before me. Liber 300AD, immediate TajMah with a GE, that was my plan .

Research Astro (20turns) to trade for Guilds and Liber and Natio; Banking and GunP too. REV: FS+Castes+Merc+Pacif 640AD.

5 cathedrals per city, GS bulbed Philo, GE launched Gold Age, 16 GA bombed (2-7-7). Total 18GP, 1 for free.

 

[Seraiel]

1. Yes, 5 cities before 2000 BC are definately too much. You need 3 cities early, because those need to get legendary, then maybe a 4th to take over Settler production so that the L-cities can grow, but morely, you want 3 cities early and 3 cities later (i. e. when you got Granaries, at least 1 Library to create GSs and also experience issues with being at happy-cap) .

2. Liberalism 6xx AD is aweful. Try with at least 1 GS. 2 GSs are better, even 3 can be justifyed when needing to research Philo. Education must be bulbed, Liberalism can be bulbed with avoiding Machinery, imo both of those bulbs are absolutely worth it or even necessary.

3. 5 Religions are not needed imho. 3 are minimum, 4 are optimum, building 5 Cathedrals / city probably generates huge culture, but I found the point at which working Cottages or Specialists often is better than whipping a Cathedral to be at 3 Cathedrals, so the 4th already needs to be produced via slow-building it. 5th Cathedral would take too long, culture-giving buildings probably give more benefit because they get heavily multiplied then, too many Cathedrals are worth too little with too little base-culture.

4. Slow AIs hurt your game. You want Asoka, Gandhi, Mansa and Hatty, or, easier, fast and peaceful religiously flavour AIs. Trade a lot, trade wisely, and you can achieve 200 BC Liberalism when doing both bulbs. Maybe 300 or even 400 BC are also possible, but not sure if optimal.

Best I can give for now.

 

[Kaitzilla]

And the winner is...

 

[jesusin]

1. Yes, 5 cities before 2000 BC are definately too much. You need 3 cities early, because those need to get legendary, then maybe a 4th to take over Settler production so that the L-cities can grow, but morely, you want 3 cities early and 3 cities later (i. e. when you got Granaries, at least 1 Library to create GSs and also experience issues with being at happy-cap) .

I really don't know what to do. If I settle city4 early I damage my economy. If I wait, best food sites are taken by Deity AI and I miss those GA in the end.

2. Liberalism 6xx AD is aweful. Try with at least 1 GS. 2 GSs are better, even 3 can be justifyed when needing to research Philo. Education must be bulbed, Liberalism can be bulbed with avoiding Machinery, imo both of those bulbs are absolutely worth it or even necessary.

Fully agree.

3. 5 Religions are not needed imho. 3 are minimum, 4 are optimum, building 5 Cathedrals / city probably generates huge culture, but I found the point at which working Cottages or Specialists often is better than whipping a Cathedral to be at 3 Cathedrals, so the 4th already needs to be produced via slow-building it. 5th Cathedral would take too long, culture-giving buildings probably give more benefit because they get heavily multiplied then, too many Cathedrals are worth too little with too little base-culture.

Agreed. But mind you, I had all 3 strategic resources. So my cathedrals were as expensive as a 3 religions game with 2 no-resource cathedrals.
I am ready to play with what the game offers, as long as it is between 3 and 5 religions. A 6th one is no doubt better ignored.

4. Slow AIs hurt your game. You want Asoka, Gandhi, Mansa and Hatty, or, easier, fast and peaceful religiously flavour AIs. Trade a lot, trade wisely, and you can achieve 200 BC Liberalism when doing both bulbs. Maybe 300 or even 400 BC are also possible, but not sure if optimal.

Fully agree.
Tech trading wisely is the most important ability you need to play Deity, IMHO.

 

[Denniz]

Results:

G-Minor 183 - Cultural, Deity, Ancient, Small, Epic, (check options)
1^st WastinTime 1160 AD
2^nd ZPV 1200 AD 103,239 points
3^rd Seraiel 1210 AD 97,771 points

Congratulations!

 

[Mitchum]

That was a close one. Congrats to the three top finishers... who all happen to be on the same SGOTM team!

 

[WastinTime]

DoW DeGaulle 8 times!
Stole 6 workers (killed one!). Why? I was not even at math yet and it was critical that I get there soon to chop out more chariots. I rarely, if ever, chop pre-math. So mainly to avoid the maintenance cost, I disbanded it.
T76, 2100BC Math, Only 5 of my 8 DoWs were pre-math.

When Peter attacked Liz, I took the opportunity to DoW Peter while his back was turned. Mainly for another worker...and a fancy trick (see below)

I played the whole game with only those 6 workers.

I built 2 settlers and captured 6 cities (for 9 total), but one city was garbage so I wanted to give it away.
Unfortunately, no one would take the city except Peter, and everyone hates Peter, so I would have had to take a big hit in diplo relations.
This is when I got the bright idea to DoW him for a worker and then make peace a couple turns later with the gift of that crappy city. Problem solved!
1300 BC: My empire is complete. Time to settle into the culture routine.
I have 4 religions already.

I thought it'd be pretty straight forward finishing this game, but I had some serious drama mid-game.
305 BC Peter and Liz make peace. Oh no!
Worse, Peter stays in war prep mode! He must be after me cus he has a treaty with Liz now.
I watch for his stack(s). Luckily they don't come around for about 13-14 turns. The peace treaty is over.
Another problem! Liz won't DoW Peter (doesn't like me enough.)
I have to switch to her religion, and give her a huge tech, and several turns ago I gave her a bunch of extra resources.
I manage to get her to friendly and then give her another tech to DoW Peter! Whew.
She drags Fred into the war and Peter gets crushed.

Funny thing: my culture flips that crappy city back to me again. This time, since Peter was destroyed I can give the city to Liz.

Here are some culture stats:

10AD: I had recently Liberalism->Nationalism, traded for Banking.
Adopt: Free Speech, caste, Merc, Pacifism (earliest I've ever done that I think...not counting Marathon speed)
8 cities, 6 workers.
I have 6 wonders (no mids, no oracle): three in the capital, three artist wonders in city 2.
No cathedrals
I have the most pathetic NEpic city ever. I thought my last settler (for a fish/rice city) would be my NE, but it go such a late start I just went with an early city. I thought it was more important to get a city making artists before the capital started making non-artists. that worked nicely since I was able to minimize the non-GAs
My NE city had a Pig-hill, one FP...and that's it. Does a grass farm count? That's enough food to run 4 artists...Woohoo.

I only had time to play this gauntlet once, so it is what it is. My dream of 1000AD finish is out.
So, how did my great people turn out with that sad NatEpic?
I ended up getting out 18 GP (none free). I wanted to have 7 cities contribute at least one GA, but the timing did not work right. I had to leave one city in the dust so I could have had 19 GP with better planning.
I think about 13 of those were GA's, The other 5 : bulb Philo, bulb Edu, 2 golden ages

With my 5 religions, I built 5-5-3 cathedrals.
Cities around 1100AD were doing 1200-1000-400 cpt
Just 3 towns and 3 villages total. (split between 2 cities)

 

[jesusin]

Congratulations! Well done

 

[pomthom]

 

[Pollina]

Some crazy good dates!

 

[Kaitzilla]

3 Great finishes!

Grats to WastinTime for getting the fastest

Disbanding workers to save money! And abusing the French
Ya, I stopped putting Peter in my culture games for just such reasons.
Too warmongerish even if his tech trading is good.