GOTM-03: Second Spoiler

[Memphus]

Good games, Ronald and Harok!
It looks like we (and Memphus) had comparable civ development in the early AD and started war about the same time, but I got the fastest victory with lowest score . Of course, my main goal was speed, but I never forget about score and now I finally understand that game balance is more interesting then I thought before.

Wait for hendrikszoon, who, possible, could reach both goals simultaneous...

And my spoiler is comming , one of these days
you will notice many more similarities in our later game, again the onyl difference you being faster but me scoring higher .

If I had to guess at the reason for this it would be that my newly conquered cities build courthouse, granary, theater (chopping) and then were set on wealth, and maximum growth, thus allowing for extra pop, but not supporting my army fast enough. While as your cities continued to supply units for the front lines.

One factor seemed evident though you had to start going both ways around the world to get it done fast (i.e. be at war with two civs at once, on differnet sides)

A final thought which I had during the game and I would love to try if I had time, would be creating a small naval fleet to hit the other end of the map (around Victoria or Asoka)and start working thier way towars my approaching armies... I am unsure of how this would have worked Although if hendrikszoon is going for domination I am willing to bet he made use of this, for faster completion

 

[mike p]

Contender, Domination, 1400AD, score: Just over 100k

This was a pretty easy game. Tailor made for conquest - build samurai, take over cities (organized!), build samurai in new city. Rinse. Repeat. I probably could have finished up a few turns earlier but I wasted time trying to get up to military tradition - I made peace with Hyuana Capac to get two techs instead of taking his last city and declaring on Asoka right away.

Still, the game was never really in question after my second war with Egypt - somewhere in the early ADs. I owned the entire map west of the sea and started in on Monty with my swordsmen and axemen. After taking two of his cities, I finished machinery, upgrade to Samurai and just kept rolling.

A little behind in tech at the end but the AI was wasting time researching things like Astronomy when they should have gone for more map-appropriate techs like chemistry which would have obsoleted my Samurai. Knowing Astronomy is basically a junk tech on an Inland Sea map when Domination is coming soon is another human player advantage I suppose.

 

[beestar]

Knowing Astronomy is basically a junk tech on an Inland Sea map when Domination is coming soon is another human player advantage I suppose.

Not this human player. By the end of the game, I didn't have much interesting to research so I picked up Astronomy and built some galleons to take my armies from the northwest industrial cities to the war front at the southeast ...

Then again, this was probably suboptimal play and I really should have de-emphasized research in favour of cranking out units.

 

[MiniMe]

Space Victory 1710AD, 95k points

I got off to a good start in general but made some decisions in midgame from 800BC to around 500AD that I would like to have done differently.

Settled 2 SW since I wanted to get closer to river + extra shield in city center. Started researching Pottery and wanted to go Mining, Bronze Working, Writing and then Alphabet. I set Kyoto to build worker and then some warriors.

My initial warrior headed for the hut that became visible since first cultural expansion would not get it. I popped a scout and sent both of them south. Scout pops a new hut a few turns later and I get Sailing! My warrior discovers a hut and since scout is not too far away I give him the task of actually popping it since it will remove the risk for hostile natives. I pop WRITING! Lucky me.

In addition my warrior spots a lone worker from Egypt and I kidnap him. Didnt real plan on going to war with Hatsy but just couldnt help myself. My warrior is then set to clear the coastway from Egypt to Kyoto to be able to get international trade route. My scout moves further south to more huts. Unfortunately I dont find much more, only 1 but didnt give anything useful. He finds a couple of more civs before he is eaten by a lion.

So after I discover Bronze Working I chop my library and designate a couple of specialists. I get a Great Scientist just before 1000BC that builds an Academy. Somewhere along there I also discover Alphabet that will allow me to trade for some of the missing techs, but cannot trade for Priesthood so need to research this one. Then for Code of Laws.

In the meantime I have set up my second city to east of capital, to get copper inside the fat cross and also access to a lot of wood. I do some serious deforestation first to chop a second settler (need it for the sweet spot to the south) and then chop the Oracle. I get Civil Service like that around 860BC.

Up until then all went rather fine but then a mediocre period follows. Instead of researching directly for machinery I fiddle around with Math + Currency + Construction, even Calendar (maybe traded for it, dont remember). Fine techs of course but probably not as good as getting machinery earlier. At 1AD I still have 12 turns to go for Machinery.

I see that Monty has a nice capital with marble allready connected. Hmmm...I need marble to build Great Library. Why dont I take it from him instead of building a new city up north? So I start building axe, swords and cats and I go to war.

By 1AD I have
* 5 cities including one taken from Monty. I am also knocking on the doors of Monty capital. Will take it shortly.
* handful useful military units
* 2 libraries
* 1 academy
* 2 courthouses
* 2 barracks
* Oracle

From this time I focus military conquest combined with infrastructure to support the new cities. Monty built Parthenon just before I took his capital. Inca built Pyramids so I felt obliged to take them as next target. Then India and England. Ended up with 63% of the map. Never really touched Egypt which might have been a mistake, the had some nice cities close to my capital.

The conquered cities built courthouse at first. Helped by workers who followed the invading fource. Once I had the necessary courthouses I built Forbidden Palace in old Inca land. That helped IMMENSELY on economy. Saved instantly 30-50 gold, and removed a good part of my deficit. I was running at 80% or actually mostly 90% science during the entire game. I also researched to get Versailles quite early as well. Built this one in Delhi and it also helped a LOT! I used two great merchants for trade missions and with the addition of conquest gold it helped me sustain a large negative deficit during war time.

After conquest phase was finished I tried to select the research path that would help me sustain all these cities and research as quickly as possible. Banking and Education came quite in handy. Then going rather quickly to Biology for extra food and then for UN in order to get the extra trade route.

My notes are not extremely structured as I am writing this off memory only.

 

[Icarex]

I have just submitted my first GOTM! Domination victory, 1886 AD, score just above 35000. This was incidentally my first domination victory in any game (I usually find the end-game a tad tedious).

Anyway, my start was a bit slow, I lost both Stonehenge and The Oracle. Consequently, getting to Cod of Law and Civil Service took longer than usual. So when Monty attacked me in 610AD, I was yet to field any samurais. I took me some time turning the tide on him. I declined his peace offer and conquered his last city in 1080AD.

Later I sent an expeditionary force to join in the first war between the Egypt and England against the Arab nation, hoping to piggyback and grab a city or two. This was a mistake, I should have fallen Egypt in the back instead!

But at this point most of my army was still on the eastern front, and seeing that I had a slight tech advantage, I decided to push further east into the land of the Inca. This was in the year 1380, I pulled Asoka into the war, and the Incan civilization was gone by 1610.

Egypt and England started a new war against the Arabs, and this time I sent 4 settlers and a “culture bomb” to fill inn between captured cities.

In 1830 I jumped on Asoka, he had few cities but was on par techwise (thanks to me). So it took me till 1860 to beat him down.

By now the quest for outer space was well on its way, I did not take any chances and prepared for my own spaceship launch, this diverted lots of good production away from military. Vicky seemed to be closest to firing her spaceship, so in 1876 I hit her hard. Ten years later I got my domination victory. England was by then building her last spaceship-part. And I was only 7 turns from going to Alpha Centaury myself.

I had lots of fun with this game, and will play the next GOTM!

 

[Vatec]

Same opening strategy as many others: moved settler SW onto plains hill.

Phase 1: Discovered Hattie to the south, waited until she discovered Buddhism, then swooped in and poached her worker. Settled NW city with copper and gold, then used axemen to finish Hattie off. Saladin went Buddhist too, and he's one of the more reliable religious allies to have, so southern border was pretty much secure.

Phase 2: Lots of barbarian cities. Barbarians founded on the ivory spot. I let them build up a little, then went in for some free practice. Consolidated until construction, then went after Monty with catapults and, eventually, elephants.

Phase 3: Great initial success against Monty, but then he caught my main stack of axemen in a weak city and threw wave after wave of horse archers at them. It went downhill rapidly from there. After the third wave of horse archers pillaged the improvements around my capital I surrendered. I might have survived (I was close to producing samurai), but I got very tired of seeing my full-strength axemen swooping down off the hills and losing to unpromoted archers in the flood plains. 90+% chance of victory. Happened at least four times.

In short, I think the strategy was sound, but my execution failed to account for excessive streaks of bad luck. A couple of tactical errors basically opened the way for Monty to move in and pillage me back to the stone age. The takeaway is: build more (and more varied) troops.

 

[Dolphan]

Adventurer - conquered in the year 820 AD. Ouch.

Tried to consolidate territory and keep up in the tech race until I could get samurai. Worked OK into the ADs - not too far behind on tech, though last on score, and going for civil service (which nobody else had yet). Then, around 600 AD, Hatty declared war. I shifted into spearman production to deal with the chariots and elephants (she got the ivory to the South) and figured I was strong enough to hold her off until i could build up a bunch of swordsmen. Then Monty declared. About 15 Aztec horse archers turned up to back up the egyptians. The end was swift and brutal. It does leave me with one question for the decent players out there though - is it normal practice to build roads all over the place, giving multiple routes between cities and resources? I suffered a lot in this game from barbarians and enemy units chopping my road links.

 

[Sparts]

Phase 1: Discovered Hattie to the south, waited until she discovered Buddhism, then swooped in and poached her worker.

Smart, hadn't thought of that.

 

[Jastrow]

I dont understand the significance of waiting until Budhism is founded. Can someone please explain?

Thanks

 

[kingjoshi]

In my game, Hatty didn't have a religion either. It would have been SOO much better if she did. Then when I conqured here, with my GP from Stonehedge, I wouldn't had more money and could research faster.

Me stealing a worker from here (hopefully) didn't affect her not getting Buddhism. But my constant battles with here probably made her focus on preservation instead of religion.

Just a view from my perspective and my game.

 

[pnp_dredd]

Entry class: Contender
Game status: Domination Victory for Japan
Game date: 1475 AD
Base score: 4733
Final score: 141031

First spoiler

Overall I was fairly happy with this win. Reading throught the threads it looks like going for a really fast domination was the way to go, whereas I milked a bit. However my score still looks moderately competitive with others who finished much earlier with less focus on population (e.g. akots 1155AD 169831, ronald 1020AD 179597).

The main difference was that I built grocers/markets instead of courthouses, which let me pump the populations up and combat war weariness. In hindsight, a few courthouses would have been a great idea. I was also storing up large gold surpluses during peace and running 40% culture during war to keep the cities growing.

I had a bit of a cash scare, and started a Golden Age in 1120 AD to stay afloat.

I didn't have a good plan for my research. I got samurai, started heading for cavalry, decided I didn't need them and started for Biology. Needless to say, I didn't get anywhere near it, and turned research off after Gunpowder. I managed to extort a few minor techs out of the AI. Victoria would NOT trade with me because of my "technical superiority" even when I had gunpowder and she had 6 other techs that I didn't have. *sigh* Sometimes you wish for Mansa.

I attacked around both sides of the world. I think I waited too long to start hitting Hatty hard - I didn't destroy her last city until 1195 AD.

In the end I was halfway through Asoka and Saladin when domination was triggered - they both had muskets, so it was a good thing I was close, or things would have turned nasty.

 

[Memphus]

Alright this is very long overdue, since I submitted quite a while ago.
(but those Olympics are just so fun to watch )

Contender Class
Game date: 930 AD Domination Win
Base score: 3584
Final score: 246283

In any case Continued from
Part One
Part1 Continued
The goal was fast domination without razing any cities, and too see if it was possible to do it without siege weapons. (AKA all done with Samurais
Okay I’ll give a quick run down of what happened
I was at war the rest of the game safe 5 turns.

In any case the non warrelated elements of game went as follows:

160AD Saladin converts to Confucianism (made lots of trade with him now)
180AD Homer from Music, plan to use him as a culture bomb in Thebes
210AD Victoria gets Taoism
260AD Moses born in Osakabe(due to Stonehenge + Oracle, this is my favorite city of all time)
260AD Build the Kong Maio (really need this money)
420AD Discover Christianity(Theocracy)
430AD Change to Theocracy
460AD Saladin completed the Parthenon and the Great Lighthouse that sneaky guy
650AD Plotemy Born
650AD Hagia Sophia (D’oh wanted to stop building this and get the $$ from it... Like I did with the Pyramids… oh well)
740AD Huayna Capac Adopts Vassalage.
This started to make me sweat, because now the tech for longbows is out there
*somewhere in here I starting building horse archers instead or Samurais because I knew Samurais had no chance of getting to the front line
(in hindsight getting guilds would have been smart)
820AD Harkuf Born
860AD Chopped out Colossus (+points)
870ADFound Nara to get 9 more squares for domination
900AD Hanging Gardens built (thanks Hendrikzoon that was cool to do)
930AD Domination Victory.


In reality after 1AD the game was pretty repetitive,

• take over city
• move up workers
• Chop out Courthouse, Theater, Granary or as much of that as possible
• set the city to maximum growth.

In the event there was a city with lots of forests chop out a wonder (Colossus, thanks Saladin for already having a forge )

What is interesting to observe though is the rate at which cities must be taken over for it to float your treasury. (other players have noticed this as well, but even if I put my slider to 100% $$$ I was still in the red, so the only option was to press forward.)

 

[Memphus]

The war Breakdown the cities are captured in the year stated
20AD Heliopolis
80AD Khoisan
250AD Thebes (and the culture bomb explodes next turn, instant productive city )
310AD Pi-Ramsess
*Descision is made that need to go both ways around the globe to win fast
320AD Elephantine
370AD Memphis
390AD Koisan
400AD Illinois (barbarian, starting to head for Monty now )
400AD Alexandria
430AD Declare war on Monty
450AD Giza, Egypt is outta there
450AD Tlaxcala
460AD Declare war on Saladin (too bad he was good for trading with)
490AD Teotihuacan
510AD Tlaxcala…wait a second I already captured that city @#$% Monty actually monted an attack force of jaguars and took his city back, (he beat 2 city garrison 2 archers) oh well that teaches me for the good luck in the earlier part of the game. But this was scary because the only thing between him and my good cities now was one warrior fortified in each. And all my attack force was going the other way.
So I had to send 2 samurias backwards to clean up the mess, as well a build some more archers to reinforce everything around that city. This was a big error and I really should have been more cautious than that, I HATE losing cities
520AD Texocco
520AD Mecca
530AD Peace with Monty (he gave me Tlaxcala back for peace, and I had sent those samurais back), in reality my top forces need a break to rest and heal.
560AD Medina
590AD Basara
600AD Damascus
610AD Kufah
610AD Etrusecan
630AD War with Monty (10 turns exactly)
640AD Calixlahuaca
640AD Nanjren See you later Saladin
650AD Tenochtitlan
680AD Tlatelolco Finally that green mess is dead
2 turns of peace
700AD Declare war with Victoria, Huayna
710AD Vilacas
720AD Warwick
740AD Hastings
780AD Canterbury
790AD Estrucan
820AD Tiwanaku
820AD Coventry
860AD London
860AD Cuzco
These were the two capitals and looking at my world % coverage, I was close, close enough that when their border expanded for the second time (forced artists) It would be game over. And good thing too because the longbows were out and my samurais were having a lot more trouble with them. (even though some of them were level 6-7 ) If I had to do it again I would use Dynamic’s approach of sending the the catapults ahead of time and then keep them moving to remove defense ahead of time since they never attack.
860AD declare a cease fire with both Victoria and Huyana to regroup
890ADDeclare war on both
My rational was this, I am going to win right away, wht not capture a couple more cities even If I suffer large loses because it will add to my score
So for the first time I was fighting battles with under 90% odds (well except the odd one)
900AD Bait Asoka into the war against Huyana (just having fun now )
900AD Corinthar…, man these city name are hard to spell
920AD Ollantayambo Inca dunzo
930AD Borders expand on London and Cuzco, Domination win.


So now lets take an interesting look at this, too keep my treasury afloat (because believe me it barley did) I had to
==>Chop a courthouse in every new city asap
==>build the FP by chopping

All the while, taking over a total of 33 cities
So from the turn I declared my first war 40 B.C.
Until the end of the game there was: 85 turns

So I was working at a ratio of 0.38 Cities per turn or 2.57 turns per city.
That is a neat stat I wouldn’t have thought when I first declared war
Taking a city every 2~3 turns

Sorry for no screen shoots this time, but basically it looks very similar to Dynamic’s you just see the sea of read encompassing the globe.

 

[Thrallia]

Spaceship Loss to Victoria, 1949.

So I lost...I haven't looked at everyone else's yet, but I haven't seen but one or two other losses...but anyway, here it is..the gory details of my loss.

Starting from where I left off, I'll list off the major wars and major events..I don't feel like making as huge a post as I did last time.

~400AD-~700AD WWI- Tokugawa, Montezuma, Huayna Capac vs Victoria, Asoka

It ended with India losing 4 cities and their tech lead over everyone(also lost the Confuscian Holy City to Montezuma.

~900AD- 1245AD WWII- Tokugawa, Montezuma, Huayna Capac, Victoria vs Asoka

Apparently Victoria smelled blood this time. She turned on her long-time ally Asoka and did killed him off for good. She took all of his major cities while the Incans took care of his minor ones.

1235AD-1400AD Border Skirmish- Tokugawa vs Montezuma
I had built up a sizable army of 15 Samurai, 5 Pikeman, and 3 Catapults, so I decided to declare war on Montezuma while(hopefully) his main armies were in India, across the world from me.
Unfortunately, shortly after taking Tlaxcoco, the closest city to him, India was destroyed by Victoria, leaving me to face at the time, the #2 military in the world as the #6 military.
My invading force was destroyed attempting to hold on to Tlaxcoco, and eventually lost it. In 1400AD, I got peace from Montezuma in exchange for a tech that he did not have. Luckily for me, while this war destroyed my entire military might, it also gave me the upper hand against him in tech...he was never able to catch up in tech after this war.

~1550AD-1650AD Border War- Montezuma vs Tokugawa, Hatshepsut, Saladin
Montezuma apparently had revenge in mind, as he declared war on me for the second time this game, hoping to catch me off guard, luckily I had recovered the majority of my military, and he still was behind me in tech(and wasn't too happy I refused to give him guilds).
The turn after he declared on me, I bribed Hatty to come to my aid with some technology she hadn't researched yet.
As her massive army(#1 in size) swarmed through my lands to reach Monty, I was glad she was on my side. I lost two invasion forces, but repelled Monty's before Hatty reached his borders. I then took advantage of her presence, and her lack of desire for his cities, by building settlers and pikemen and coming in behind Hatty to place a settler in every spot that Monty used to have a city(Hatty was very efficient at razing his cities). During this war, I discovered gunpowder and was the first in the world to discover it. I then proceeded to Chemistry and built some quick Grenadiers. I used a force of 6 Grenadiers to come and take 3 of Monty's last cities while Hatty was sieging the Aztec capital.
Finally, all Monty had left was the Indian city he had taken in WWI, but even that was taken from him in 1650AD, as Saladin smelled blood and besieged Bombay and destroyed the Aztec civilization.

This war, while mainly fought by Hatshepsut, I felt was a turning point, as I doubled my land mass and rid myself of an annoyance of a neighbor. I also found myself second only to Hatty in tech at this point.

1730-1930 Border Skirmish II- Huayna Capac vs Tokugawa, Hatshepsut
Less than 100 years after the destruction of the Aztec Civilization, and Huayna Capac's only friend, He decided I was ripe for the pickings. He had developed Cavalry and Riflemen, while I was still 10 turns away from getting rifling myself. He stormed my border, taking 2 cities before my grenadiers could wake up and throw anything.
I called to Hatty for help, but she didn't care. And I shortly lost another city. He razed two of them to the ground, and conquered a fourth by 1745AD.
At this point, I had lost all the land I gained in the Aztec War, and was in danger of losing my main cities. Finally, Hatty decided that she wanted to help me...for 500 gold. I quickly accepted and watched as she flanked the Incan armies and conquered all the cities I had lost to Capac.
I didn't get them back, and Hatty didn't manage to conquer any of the Incan major cities, but I was safe from his armies, her cities were in the way.
She then peaced him, and he was completely cut off from my cities.
For the next 125 years there was a cold war brewing between Huayna Capac and me, as he continued bombarding Osaka, but never sent any galleons across the water. During this time, my infrastructure began to soar, and I lept into 1st place in GNP, which meant that I had a chance at catching up in tech hopefully.

Unfortunately, He snuck a galleon in between a couple replacement frigates, landed a rifleman and 3 cavalry, and then captured and razed one of my border cities. I killed off his invasion force and sued him for peace, he finally was willing to accept, but only if I gave him 300 gold. I was willing, because war weariness was beginning to wear on my people, and I did not want to lose any more cities to sneak attacks. Thus ended the Incan-Japanese war, with me losing one more city.

1850AD- Victoria and Saladin both finish the Apollo Program and thus begins the space race....I had just finished researching railroad myself and was trying to race toward the UN.

1870AD- WWIII- Saladin vs Tokugawa, Hatshepsut, Victoria
Saladin brought a phalanx of tanks to my borders through the formerly Azteca lands, declared war on me, and immediately razed my rebuilt border town.(which itself had been built on the ruins of a razed Aztec city, Tlaxcoco)
I had only gotten Cavalry twenty years before, so I was completely outmatched. Luckily, my defeat at the hands of the Incans had taught me to build a large standing army. I had already built 12 cavalry when Saladin attacked, and I was able to kamikaze 3 of his 4 tanks to death, but not before I took heavy casualties. Osaka, a city of 20k culture, home of the Great Lighthouse, and my border city with Egypt was razed, taking with it 35% of my total culture and 2M population.
I also lost another border city I had with Egypt, which contained 10k culture and 1.4M population. The cultural borders of Egypt passed over the ruins of Osaka, making it impossible to rebuild, and Hatty took full advantage of this prime real estate, founding a city that grew to size 10 by 1925AD
In the meantime, I took advantage of my very favourable relations with Hatshepsut and Victoria to set up a world war against Saladin. Hatty declared for Mass Media, and Victoria declared for 900 gold.

Hatty vanquished the last remaining Arab tank in my lands, and razed the city he had built in Azteca after my cities had been razed. She took one border city from Saladin and then peaced him.

At this time, Hatty speed built the UN, taking with it my only chance for a victory in this game.

Saladin refused to peace with me, but it didn't matter Victoria was out for blood, given that Saladin was her only competition for the Space Race, she took every one of his cities within 20 years and in 1929 the Arab empire was destroyed.

By 1929, I had researched all but two of the required technologies for the spaceship, and was building the apollo program, hoping to catch up in parts before Victoria could finish hers.

Unfortunately, in 1949, 4 turns before my Apollo Program even finished, Victoria won with a space race victory.

In-game score: 2380
End Score: ~3300

Basically, I got myself behind in everything at the beginning, and never caught up because I couldn't seem to balance military and infrastructure build up.

 

[ewokimpi]

First, congratulations to Memphus on your fantastic game.

And thank you to Thrallia for posting your loss. We all learn from each other.

Entry class: Adventurer
Game status: Diplomatic Victory for Japan
Game date: 1860 AD
Base score: 3168
Final score: 16613.25

I did not deserve this victory, but did work hard to be in position to win if a break went my way.


When we left the Japanese empire at the first spoiler http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=3676383&postcount=14 I expected to lose in short order, so wrote the post as a story; at least that was amusing. To summarize, I built my capital on the wrong hill (no fresh water), so crippled early population growth. I didn't have the skills to recover from my error, so was hopelessly behind the entire game.

At the time I wrote the post, the game had advanced into the 700ADs. Japan was at war with both Monty and Huayna. Japan fought Monty to a standstill, and peace had been declared. However Huayna kept sending chariots/horse archers into the Japanese domain to be killed by spears. (In this game, I for sure learned the value of spears!) Then, in 720AD, Huayna's Infantry SOD showed up! (see 1st screen) While the city might have survived this attack, you are looking at my entire army and all available reinforcements on that screen. "If I lose this army, the game is lost", I thought.

Here, I quit the game for four days.

When I returned to face my punishment, it occurred to me * what if I ask for peace * ? A new thought!?!
Huayna said "Hey, sure, see you next time, have a nice day!" or words to that effect.

Saved!

Must have killed off enough of his units earlier, I guess.

Well, now that Japan was still alive, I wanted to see how long I could survive. I entertained no illusions about winning.

Hmm, let's see... peaceful, lovable butter-won't-melt-in-her-mouth Hatty, or Monty-he-of-the-skulls?

I think I know who to hate!

So, as I painfully researched towards Samurai (didn't start my first Sam until 1025AD), I also switched religion to get friends. Hatty and Saladin shared Judaism, and as they cover Japan's southern flank, I converted. After all, Monty already hated me, and I was expecting to get wiped out by him or Huayna anyway. But Samurai got researched, and Huayna got interested in dismembering Asoka. So I had Monty all to myself for 300 hundred years. Stopped research to convert the troops to Sams (Japan was so far behind in research, the pause did not matter). Samurai, Cats and Els, and two wars, from 1215AD to 1500AD, left Monty with two cities buried on that peninsula inside Huayna's territory where a lot of other players saw Monty cities. A few turns later, Saladin sent an army of rifles through my lands and Huayna's lands to wipe Monty out. Good riddance.


Well, still alive, but now the immediate neighbor of Huayna. I never really entertained the idea of attacking Huayna, as I thought Japan was much weaker than he. In retrospect, Japan may have been able to make progress against Huayna, as he was only a little ahead in tech. What to do?

So in the early 1500ADs, I evaluated the position and decided to drop warfare and go for the UN. I believed it was the only victory condition Japan had a chance for.

So, evaluating the position at 1500AD, we find:

Hatty and Saladin are Pleased with Japan because they share the same religion.
Vicky could care less about Japan, and Asoka is somewhat suspicious, but on the other side of the world. Huayna is annoyed with me, but more annoyed with Asoka.
Japan is 14 (!) techs behind the leaders. (Actually, maybe that was later than 1500AD.. )
Japan, having Monty's land, has the potential for the largest population.

So I needed to hold off Huayna while researching towards the only feasible victory condition, Diplomatic Victory.

Actions:

Sign defensive pacts with Hatty and with Saladin. This may have held off Huayna.
Later, get Liberalism for Free Religion, and abandon Judaism for Free Religion The result was that Hatty and Saladin were still Pleased with Japan, and Huayna was brought up to Cautious.
*
Research towards the UN: Scientific Method, Physics, Electricity, Radio, Mass Media.
*
Develop a great people city. Edo was founded laughably late in 1080AD up in the Northwest corner of the map, near the Iron and Pigs. I think this was a good great people site, I just founded it 2000 years too late... This city did provide a crucial Great Engineer!
*

From 1600AD - 1860AD, Hatty, Saladin, Vicky and Asoka were all going for Spaceship. As they were, collectively, 14 techs ahead of Japan, they should have every expectation of Victory. Huayna was off in the northeast corner hating people.


Milestone! The UN was built by Japan using the great engineer in 1838AD. (See second screen) Japans opponent in the election for Secretary General is Hatty. The pattern is set with this election, and the following elections for Diplomatic Victory. The nations of the world like Japan enough to elect it Secretary General, but don't like Japan enough to vote it victory.

Japan gets Vicky, Saladin,
not Asoka, Huayna.

Well, I knew I couldn't get Huayna to vote for Japan, so I tried to find a way to get Asoka. Japan dropped its defensive pacts (actually, Egypt dropped its pact with Japan first) between elections. Tried to gift something to Asoka, but since Japan was backward and impoverished, all I could do was drop research to zero and send cash donations: Not Enough.


Then, suddenly Vicky is opponent for Secretary General office.
Japan still wins Secretary General, but I can think of no play to get Hatty, Saladin, and Asoka all to vote for me.


THE MIRACLE

Turn 463, 1853AD:
Huayna Capac has declared war on Asoka!
Kolhapur has been captured by the Incan Empire!!!
*
Turn 467, 1857AD:
Bangalore has been captured by the Incan Empire!!!

Diplomatic Victory vote comes up in 1858ad and HUAYNA IS THE OPPONENT!!!!!!!!!! (screen three)

Japan wins the vote!!! EVERYONE (except Asoka, still riding the fence) prefers Japan to Huayna!!!!! (screen four says it all)

****

I did not deserve to win this game. However, I did work hard to put myself into position where a victory was possible. Then a break (that I did not make) went my way.

Critical moves as I see it:
Ask Huayna for peace.
Get Samurai (finally).
Defeat Monty to gain territory, particularly population.
Recognize that the only possible victory type is Diplomatic, and research towards it.
Make defensive pacts with Hatty and Saladin to hold Huayna off, and later
Convert to Free Religion to reduce Huayna's negative modifiers against Japan.
Develop a great people city, if very late..
Employ the one and only GE I got to build the UN

and ...

be standing there still breathing when the break came Japan's way.

Wondering::: will run some replays from saves...

At the beginning. . Could I have survived Huayna's attack? And still attack Monty in a timely fashion?
At the end . . Could I have bribed Huayna to attack Asoka? And so caused the diplomatic victory myself, rather than partaking of luck?


side notes:

Scouted opponents capitals with missionaries, camping one in their Caps for many turns.
This was good: I could see how upgraded each power's units were, and how many.
This was bad: Couldn't build more missionaries!
Explorers/Scouts are better for this.

For those folk who think Hatty doesn't build units: My missionary/scout found 14 gun ships, 5 infantry, 12 artillery, 5 SAM infantry, and 2 measly cavalry in Thebes in the 1800ADs.

I had defensive pacts with two powers, but it never occurred to me what would happen if those two powers went to war against each other... Fourteen gun ships, closer to me than to Saladin. Hmmmmm...

I have 6.74559% of the points Memphus does. Why did the rest of us play?

Because it was terrific fun! Looking forward to GOTM4, whence doubtless I will be crushed.

 

[Thrallia]

Because it was terrific fun! Looking forward to GOTM4, whence doubtless I will be crushed.

you and me both

I should have known in the 1500s it was too late for me to get a cultural victory(having never gone for one before though, I wasn't sure) and so I wasted my 4th Great Engineer speed building Broadway...if I'd kept him around I could have used him to get the UN.

Instead I lost out on it by 4!!!! turns to Hatty...since Hatty loved me(+16, and I never even shared her religion! got +9 from long fair trading with her) and she had 1/3 of the total votes, I would have been a shoo in for Sec-Gen, although winning would have been difficult. Huayna hated me, Saladin hated me(although I showed him! I bribed Victoria into killing him!! mwahahaha)

I think it would have come down to whether my opponent was Hatty or Victoria, as Huayna hated Victoria more than he hated me, but loved Hatty.

 

[hrc333]

So lost space race to India in early 1900's. This is my 2nd GOTM in a row I have lost. Fun but I am above my head at these levels.

I went to war with Monty and by the time I had him out, I was really far behind in Tech. By the time I started to catch up in Tech and actually had the score lead (first time in the last two games) the Inca's (even though he was pleased with me at +8) surprised attack me. I managed to hold the line on the initial attack by selling so techs to pay for quick unit upgrades. I did finally go on the offensive with the Inca's but only took a couple of cities since I had Tanks & he had Mech. Inv. War sadness caused me to accept peace. I got the UN but lost the vote for leader to Victoria. I had really good relations with here. I won the chair and think I may have had the votes, but the game end the turn after I won the chairman position.

As I looked back at the last two GOTM at the higher levels, I try to figure what I do wrong. A couple questions I have for the better players, that are hard to tell from peoples posts.

1. Do you use workers to change improvments for cities through out the game? I almost never change a improvement with a worker. I wonder if this is a mistake and I should be changing worker improvments as the game goes on. I almost never have windmills, workshops, etc.

2. I almost never us GP for Golden Age. It just seems like that the individual abilities of GP are more valuable than needing two for a 10 turn golden age. I was wondering if people us GP for Golden Ages or not?

Thanks for any advice.

 

[akots]

... 1. Do you use workers to change improvments for cities through out the game? I almost never change a improvement with a worker. I wonder if this is a mistake and I should be changing worker improvments as the game goes on. I almost never have windmills, workshops, etc.

2. I almost never us GP for Golden Age. It just seems like that the individual abilities of GP are more valuable than needing two for a 10 turn golden age. I was wondering if people us GP for Golden Ages or not?

Thanks for any advice.

By no means please consider these thoughts as some valuable advice. But they might be helpful or so I hope. As you've noted, you were falling behind in techs. That might mean that you did not build enough cottages early on or might be even later in the game. Let's say you've had about 6 or 7 cities before going to war. By looking at the surrounding terrain, you can see which cities have highest production. You might need at least 2 cities with high number of hammers on Monarch on this map settings to keep it up with AI. These 2 production cities should have some grassland tiles and others are production resources and hills. You then irrigate the grassland (or even flood plains) and mine the hills and build forge and barracks in these cities. You won't need other improvements there except those which are required for growth (health of happiness). Later you can build factories and other stuff to increase production. Also, you can try to build wonders in these cities if you can. Otherwise, these cities should produce only military and nothing else.

The other 4 or 5 cities should have as many cottages as reasonably possible as early as reasonably possible. These other cities also can greatly benefit from such improvements as Libraries, Universities, Markets, Banks, and Grocers.

There are also some general type improvements such as granaries and courthouses which should be built in every city also as soon as possible.

It is obvious, this cannot be achieved easily with automated workers since their "master" has no idea about your plans for city specialization.

Another thing is that from time to time, you can chop some forest somewhere around the city borders to speed up some critical build. This means that by the end of the game, you would not have much forests left in your area.

As to the second question, GPs are nice, but are not required to win the game in most cases, similar to religions unless going for the cultural victory. It might be easier to ignore GP completely as well as religions and try to focus on research and buildup of the empire without paying much attention to these factors. If you feel like you are falling behind or cannot make the ends meet in terms of budget or simply wish to build some wonder which you know you can miss, then triggering GA with GP might be a good idea, especially on Monarch. otherwise, GP won't make a lost game a win and lack of them won't make a won game a loss imho in most cases.

Please note, this is by no means a good advice, just some random thoughts which I hope are somewhat helpful.

 

[ionimplant]

1. Do you use workers to change improvments for cities through out the game? I almost never change a improvement with a worker. I wonder if this is a mistake and I should be changing worker improvments as the game goes on. I almost never have windmills, workshops, etc.

2. I almost never us GP for Golden Age. It just seems like that the individual abilities of GP are more valuable than needing two for a 10 turn golden age. I was wondering if people us GP for Golden Ages or not?

for 1, i never did that but i seriously think we should. i am just lazy and hate micromanagement. as for how to change improvements, this shouldn't be too difficult to decide. for example, if one of your production cities have grown to its happiness limit, you should change whatever food improvement to other types of improvement. just improve the tiles according to the specialization of your cities. if you decide to change the specialization of one city, then there will be a lot of worker action.

for 2, from my reading other posts, i find that golden age is generally only useful when you have a certain number of cities since its benefit is directly scaled by the number of your cities. and generally you don't want more than 1 or 2 golden age. some calculation shows that great people's individual ability is almost inevitably better than triggering golden ages.

 

[Memphus]

I have 6.74559% of the points Memphus does. Why did the rest of us play?

Because it was terrific fun! Looking forward to GOTM4, whence doubtless I will be crushed.

You might not of had the same score, but I definetly got more enjoyment from reading your spoiler than playing the last 1000 years of my game.

Like I said after 1AD it was just a repetitive process, which I am sure any other player could have completed (give or take 20 turns) irregardles of their playing level.

The key to civ has always been the early game.

What I would really enjoy, (although am not sure if this would ever happen or how it could happen, maybe one month for fun )

Was that if you desired at the point of 1AD you could trade games with another player.

So in this case at 1AD ewokimpi gets my save and I get his, then we both submit our game and our score gets put together.
The catch is you have to trade game with someone on the opposite end of the spectrum.

I.E you finish in the top half, you have to trade with the bottom half (from the last GOTM)

Now that would not only give some of the newer players a chance to explore what to do with a great opening, but also for the veterans players challenge them to adapt to an opening which would be below thier expectations.