G-Minor 28

[ParadigmShifter]

I played a game up to 1634AD with Fred, SE-tastic, no cottages built at all. However I'm on the big continent with 4 other civs (well not Huayna Capac anymore), so I don't think conquest is on the cards. Monty is pleased but "Has enough on his hands right now", had to declare on Kublai (who I already had a war with after beating Saladin down to 1 city) when he had a huge stack of Knights and Trebs next to Mecca, while upgrading them to cavalry, but I haven't got enough troops so will probably lose 3 cities, I alredy razed one of his in revenge. He has a nice naval production city I was eyeing up for Ironworks (already have HE/West Point and 2 settled GGs in my military production city).

I'm probably going to try another game before finishing this one off, if I finsh it at all. I can't see a conquest with only 2 peaceful civs on the other continent (Cyrus and Gandhi), my plan was to kill everyone on my continent except Monty (who has been a war ally vs. Saladin, but he vassalized Sally peacefully when I couldn't finish him off due to Kublai's border pop preventing me from reaching his last city), raze the other continent then backstab backwards Monty for the win.

I have a military lead on Kublai but will prbably have to wait for Panzers to finish him off, I had planned to use Panzers to finish off the other continent. I could easily have won space race or domination I think but the conquest thing would be too tricky.

I'll probably try another start, hoping for a 4:3 split civs wise on each continent. Fred was pretty good though, no offensive war until cavalry bulding a healthy tech lead with pyramid representation and caste system, then police state/slavery/theocracy for smashing Saladin and a bit of a bite from Kublai. Kublai built too many troops though. Monty was my attack dog but with his WHEOOHRN I think he'll try and invade during the war with Kublai that is ongoing at the moment. I should have waited until Kublai declared but I thought I could hold him off with a few rifles, not enough though. They seem very ineffective against his combat 3 cavalry.

All my blitz cavalry kept dying in the war against Saladin. I think I'll take combat 4 first before giving them blitz in future.

 

[Gosha190]

I did not generate maps so far, but as it seems to me conquest must be finished before 1000AD - it will be a good game! So we are needed to get astronomy before 1AD - this is the main problem to resolve.

 

[Conquistador 63]

Since I finally sorted out my problems and patched Warlords to 2.13, I decided to have a go with the Vikings. On the first run I got a nice start with gold, pig, clam, marble. Then I got 3 early techs from huts. Asoka, Capac and Fred(?) were neighbours. Things were looking bright for a CS sling when HC built Oracle around 1900BC. Then I saved game and went watch football on TV.
Not sure if I'll continue that game. Maybe try a early UU rush instead. Do you think Cyrus is a good option? Also, I'm thinking high seas and minimum opps. Does that make sense?

 

[Gosha190]

If you choose high sea there is a very high chance to get your own continent without AI))) As I remember in this case map consists of 4 little continents.
I think that you need leader with a high scientific potential like Cath, Peter, Capac (he is excluded), Elisabet... I am gonna to play this way.

 

[Mad Professor]

Maybe try a early UU rush instead. Do you think Cyrus is a good option? Also, I'm thinking high seas and minimum opps. Does that make sense?

I'm thinking maybe maxing the number of opponents to cram them in tight which greatly increases the chances of them fighting among themselves and doing half the job for you. Since it's continents, there will be at least a group of civs on some other continent you can't reach until you get astronomy who will get quite a while (with monarch bonuses) to get established. On the other hand, if they are crammed in tight and at each other's throats, they should be a little easier to finish off when you get to them

 

[Mad Professor]

If you choose high sea there is a very high chance to get your own continent without AI))) As I remember in this case map consists of 4 little continents.
I think that you need leader with a high scientific potential like Cath, Peter, Capac (he is excluded), Elisabet... I am gonna to play this way.

You definitely don't want a continent to yourself, that's true. I'm not sure whether to go all science (with a financial leader) so as to get to astronomy early and then still have all civs to wipe out, or to choose a leader with an early UU, do some dirty work early on the way to astonomy - which will slow me down getting there, but will leave me with less to do when I get there... Capac would be ideal in vanilla (financial/aggressive/early UU) but (sigh) he's excluded

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Ragnar has those traits in Warlords.
I think you want 2 or 3 out of 7 civs to wipe out on your home continent, get a couple of settled great generals, build west point or run theo/vassalage to get city raider 3 berserkers with free amphibious promo, research chemistry but not rifling (so you can keep building berserkers), save a load of cash and upgrade them to grenadiers and raze all the coastal cities on the other continent.

Hmm I think you can get machine guns without rifling too, so land a nice stack of cannon and MGs to do the city defence reducing might be in order too.

But a lucky game could easily win... raging barbs wiping out the other continent for you, getting astronomy from a hut, etc.

I've already played as Ragnar in my HOF so I'm not going to use him. I haven't carried on my Fred game, now thinking of giving Cyrus a go for highly promoted units.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

No submissions yet anyway, over half way through.

I started a game as Cyrus, another 5-2 split with me on the 5 civ continent, eliminated Liz easily then overexpanded and not teching enough to avoid going bust before catapults... oh dear. (Oh look - marble for Great Library, I should probably raze that barb city but it has gems, etc.).

I'll probably start another game hoping for a 4-3 split. Also lost 2 battles against barb warriors with Immortals at 99.4% odds.

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

I plan on submitting when I get done with the victory. My game is a 4-3 split and I'm playing as Qin on warlords.

I'm trying to overpower everyone with masses of Cho-ku's. It's going good so far, but my last 3 opponents have longbows. I think I will leave the hill cities to last and see if I can make them my vassals instead of suiciding all my army.

 

[Maydrock]

I think I will leave the hill cities to last and see if I can make them my vassals instead of suiciding all my army.

You don't want to take on vassals in a conquest game do you?

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Yes you do, vassals count as eliminated unless they break free. Only problem with vassals is: more maintenance (I don't think this has anything to do with how many cities they have, it is more maintenance for each of your own cities), and if you are trying to keep some civs happy while you kill everyone else you get a diplo hit for having a vassal (I think it might be -1 per vassal or it could be -1 for every 2, like defensive pacts, I don't know).

You get +1 happiness for every vassal you have also.

You want to make sure you vassalise the last civ remaining to win quicker anyway. Earlier on, you may want to vassalise civs but they are not going to be much help in a war (they will be weak) or for tech trades since you will have probably razed alot of their cities. Someone else might vassalise them if you don't though and that can mean a quick change of plans.

EDIT: Forum is "teh slow".

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

You want to make sure you vassalise the last civ remaining to win quicker anyway.

Yeah vassalage is good if you are in the final stages of conquest. In my experience you have to have captured or razed almost all of their core cities for them to capitulate. It lets you get away with not hunting down those last size 1-2 cities.

In my case I am hoping that taking all of the cities on flat ground will be enough damage to force them to capitulate thus saving a few units that would have suicided on hill defending units.

 

[Mad Professor]

I've just submitted a 1628AD conquest win (57K score) on vanilla - no vassals... Way slower than I hoped for, but I don't have the time to play another one - I have a life to live as well!

I played Hatty and put in 10 civs. I started on a continent with 4 other civs, and there were two other continents apart from mine, one with 3 and one with 2 civs. I used Egypt's war chariots to wipe out 3 of the 4 other civs on my continent BC, keeping Capac's cities (he was a close neighbour) and burning down all others (Monty and Gandhi). I did a couple of early war declarations to steal workers. I didn't build a single worker the entire game. To that point the game was going well. Then I put the foot down on the science to race to astronomy. I had just built the Great Library and combined that with the national epic to peel off a list of great scientists in Thebes. Unfortunately I was way slower getting to astronomy than I would have liked - the early military campaign no doubt put me way behind on that one. I went exploring with a caravel the instant I got optics of course to pick targets and get the circumnavigation bonus, and at the same time launched a war on the remaining civ on my contnent (Saladin), and wiped him out, keeping most of his cities now that I had the economy to support it, and knowing I'd need the production.

Meanwhile Cyrus had wiped out Peter leaving him alone on his continent - and big and powerful to boot. As soon as I could, I swarmed accross the seas and wiped out the remaining 4 remote civs (Tokugawa, Mao, Bismarck and Cyrus). Two of them (Bismarck and Cyrus) were huge and had many, many cities, and Cyrus had cavalry all over the place by the time I got to him. That didn't slow my cavalry and rifles down though - it just increased the losses - and the WW - I had the culture slider up pretty high near the end to keep the people at their work...

If there's not someone out there who can beat 1628AD by a long way I'll be shocked. Go for it!

 

[Harbourboy]

I'm having one attempt at this with Julius Caesar. I got iron in second city so that's a good start.

 

[Gosha190]

I have finished my first and last attempt: Peter (for generating a lot of GS and fast building of workers), 6 AI, high sea level.

I was looking for a start with early BW from a hut and I got it... and I got significantly more than I was looking for

 

[bshumbera]

Submitted a 1553 AD win with Catherine (vanilla) for my FIRST EVER conquest victory. I focused on REX to 6 cities and economy early, then axe/sword/cat rush on my home continent. My continent had 4 opponents (2 on the other continent) and I played with high seas. After capturing most of my home continent, I sat 4% shy of the domination limit. I got two GS to pop Astro, then rushed to Chemistry and Steel for Grens and Cannons. I wiped the second continent very easily. I've tried 3 times to improve this date using an early war chariot rush with Hatty and can't seem to sustain my economy to get to Astro quick enough. The other continent is always way ahead of me in tech by that time. I may try once more with another civ, but I'm not sure. It doesn't help that I had never done a conquest win before.

 

[bshumbera]

Finally got a decent game with Hatty, but didn't improve my score much with a 1484 AD finish. This time around I went for all out war early with war chariots, keeping only the capitals (4) and 3 other decent cities on my continent (just enough for Forbidden palace). Got Astro around 800 AD, but had a time dealing with longbows on the other continent by using massive amounts of cats and a few swords.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

I'm not going to be able to finish any of my attempts (with a conquest win anyway). Tried Fred, Cyrus and Ramesses, got bogged down dealing with the home continent from a winning position, but conquest was never really on the cards.

Good luck to everyone else, I'm still hoping I can hang on to my 3rd place in the major!

 

[FiveAces]

I have finished my first and last attempt: Peter (for generating a lot of GS and fast building of workers), 6 AI, high sea level.

I was looking for a start with early BW from a hut and I got it... and I got significantly more than I was looking for

Even though I didn't try this one, now that it's over I'm curious as to what you got that was significantly more than you were looking for?

 

[Gosha190]

Even though I didn't try this one, now that it's over I'm curious as to what you got that was significantly more than you were looking for?

you'll see that soon as the updates will occur
(it was extremely lucky continents map)