GOTM 114 -- Final Spoiler

[kcd_swede]

GOTM 114 - Napoleon (Immortal) - Final Spoiler

,

So how did your game after 1AD go? Tell everyone about your amazing victory (or your embarrassing defeat)!

Had to get this spoiler up quickly... figured a lot of folk suffered "game over" syndrome.

Any Challengers have something to report?

Reading Requirements

Stop! If you are participating in GOTM 114 then you MUST NOT read this thread unless

• You have submitted your entry

Posting Restrictions

• Do not post any savegame file from the game. Discussions and screenshots are fine but not actual games.

 

[PattonTwo]

Somehow I expected to do so much better. With no one nearby and so much land for good city spots (except the obvious lack of happy resources) I just started out REXing. I had 6 cities up by 1000 BC but it proved too many without anything to help them be happy. There wasn't much to whip out since I had no one to go attack.

In retrospect I'm guessing I should have whipped some galleys and axes and gone off to fight anyway because it turns out that's the only way anyone was going to have anything to trade with me.

I correctly ignored alphabet assuming the AI would get there first and instead went for currency both out of need and to hopefully have something to trade. By the time I got it (around 1 AD) 2 of the AIs had it (I met only 3 AIs all game) and Khan refused to trade with me. He "had his reasons" but I never figured out what they were. By 1000 AD he still had some reason not to trade with me.

I resigned the game in 1000 AD. I had 11 cities but was producing only 8 gpt at zero tech. Hopelessly behind in tech and too many cities (with no happiness) means no hope of recovery. I could try to whip up a navy and army but I'm so far behind in tech I have zero chance to take even one city anywhere.

I like builder games but with no happiness and even with my taking the easy save I was clearly doomed from the start. I'm looking forward to finding out who wins and looking at their game logs to get a feel for their tech/war/REX path. I might go back and try to play this again to see if I can do better but really I don't know how I would approach this game to win. Still learning here!

Thanks for the game as always. Even though it was too hard for me I'm sure others will still do well.

 

[kcd_swede]

Sorry for your loss. Congrats on having the first submission. If this keeps up, you could finish first anyhow,

 

[Jastrow]

I quit after getting sneak attacked. Was on my way to a spaceship win, but I hate playing without the buffy red-fist feature...

 

[High King J.J.]

I quit after getting sneak attacked. Was on my way to a spaceship win, but I hate playing without the buffy red-fist feature...

The same with me. Just as I was sending all my extra troops to finally crush that barb island HC sends a little expedition my way, just frigging frigates and galleons with knights but he had cavalry too. I had nothing to stop them so why bother. I had managed to settle the whole continent which had wrecked my economy for quite a while. And I had gotten early religion in the capital, a GPro from the Henge to enshrine and get some income but with every new city costing 9 gpt on size 1 and even closed borders not helping after someone gets astronomy, there was no way to win.

 

[damnrunner]

Spaceship loss 1929 to HC.

Game started well. Got Pyramids and with Representation was able to keep a decent tech rate with a few scientists despite an otherwise horrific econ.

I expanded pretty slowly early on. Had two protected cities to the west and used capital to fend off what felt like a not more barbarians than normal. Took far longer than it should have to build a city out by the copper to the east and I had a few improvements pillaged before I was able to build axes.

I got alphabet before most others and having sent out some early WBs I had contact with everyone including Mongols who most had not yet contacted. Was able to do some very effective tech trading.

Also managed to build Great Library which helped get a good GP farm/science city going. It was the pigs seafood site in the west and by end of game was doing over 60 GPP and 500 science per turn.

Around 1000AD I developed a scheme to invade the mongols. They were very far behind tech wise (still just archers) and I was close to having maces. Their cities were also fairly spread out so once captured would not have to worry about culture as much. But by time I had maces they had LBs. So I delayed.

I did take island city around this time (i had also recently got catapults). This opened up a lot of commerce and I should have done it ages earlier. I then focused on settling the remaining spots on continent (had to close borders with Russia/Persia a few times to send back some of their settler attempts).

My scheme now was to hit Mongols with muskets and then follow up 1st wave with grenadiers/cannons. I had a decent army built up and was teching liberalism which I was planning to use to bulb Astro. Sadly India beat me to liberalism. It was my fault too as I had traded Education to India, but I thought I was far enough ahead teching Liberalism that they couldn't beat me.

This slowed me down considerably and when I did invade (around 1500) the Mongols managed some tech trades to get cavalry at the same time and I got pounded. I managed to take one city and could have got one more with better unit management, but I shortly there after was overwhelmed and had to sue for peace.

At this point there was no military option left in the game and I decided to go for space. I was on target for a 1950s completion date. Actually though I had a good chance of it too as HC (as well as everyone else) was in a massive war with England. My bigger fear was a UN loss and HC was very close to winning that as well.

 

[kcd_swede]

Around 1000AD I developed a scheme to invade the mongols.

Everything sounded good up until then. What did you want to gain with the war? More land? Did you not have enough at the time?

I did take island city around this time (i had also recently got catapults). This opened up a lot of commerce and I should have done it ages earlier. I then focused on settling the remaining spots on continent (had to close borders with Russia/Persia a few times to send back some of their settler attempts).

Important lesson!!! Having international trade routes (kill the barb island) is better than having more trade routes (Great Lighthouse, Currency, etc).

My scheme now was to hit Mongols with muskets

Muskets are the worst. I'd never start any fight with muskets. IMHO your second wave should have been your first wave.

but I thought I was far enough ahead teching Liberalism that they couldn't beat me

That sounds like my playstyle... a definite improvement opportunity.

At this point there was no military option left in the game and I decided to go for space.

Whatever happened to "All options are on the table (all the time)"??

I think I would have gone for fission and nuked the world out of spite.

Thanks for the nice write-up. You've got the top game so far of all the spoiler reports. Too bad gold medals only are awarded in the event of victory.

 

[c00per]

I think I would have gone for fission and nuked the world out of spite.

Totally forgot about that option.

 

[damnrunner]

Everything sounded good up until then. What did you want to gain with the war? More land? Did you not have enough at the time?

I had thought I'd give global conquest a go on a hard difficulty level. Mongols seemed best place to kick that off.

Muskets are the worst. I'd never start any fight with muskets. IMHO your second wave should have been your first wave.

Fact. By time war was over I had rifles. But my armies were mostly dead by that point. Fail hard.

I think I would have gone for fission and nuked the world out of spite.

Would have been cathartic, if not for UN anti-nuke activism. Damn hippies.

 

[Minou]

Once the pesky Barbarian Island fell in the early AD years, Peter had to get the ax by virtue of being closest. Cyrus attacked Peter at the same time, and I got the three southern cities with Elephant/Catapult stacks, including the great seafood city for NE, while Cyrus wiped out the Russian north. That early war hurt my economy for a time by cutting off trade routes and imported luxury resources. By the time it was over I had decided to go for Domination since the AIs did not seem nearly as advanced miltarily as I expected for Immortal.

Around 1000AD I pressed into India, winning two coinflip battles to capture a key cities with my last two troops before declaring peace and spending some time building Oxford. Around this time Kublai Khan sailed in and traded Optics after I gifted him a bunch of techs to get the +4 bonus. This let me get Astronomy with Liberalism next turn, for the very helpful Galleons. These were used to drop off troops and conquer Mongolia pretty easily. My favorite part of the war was when a group of Three Musketeers held off a huge attacking stack from a hilltop city, making my work much easier.

The late game was a slog. I wanted to avoid war with Victoria and Cyrus due to their huge armies, so I launched attacks on the other three with Cavalry/Cannon/Grenadier groups. India's remaining cities fell easily. Monte was also rapidly defeated, but unfortunately for me Victoria had several mass stacks of Cavalry and captured about half the Aztec land.

The war against HC was a bit more difficult as troops had to be shuttled across the narrow sea. The first few cities fell quickly but by the time I got to the middle of the continent some enemy Cavalry snuck behind the lines to reclaim a key city and pop the borders back out, slowing the march of troops by many turns. By the last few cities, Machine Guns started appearing and mowing down my attackers, and I was lucky to finish the war without running out of troops.

At this point I was just about a dozen tiles shy of domination, thanks to England snatching those Aztec cities earlier. In the end, I had to found 7 or 8 cities on tiny islands or in isolated icy spots to gain the last few tiles. In fact I think I ended up only 0.2% above the threshold. Having fallen way behind in tech, I could have easily lost about 10 cities to either remaining AI declaring (would have been helicopters versus horses) but they liked me enough not to attack. Victory in 1882AD.

 

[Minou]

EDIT: Oops, looks like I inadvertently played the Adventurer save. No wonder the AI seemed so weak for Immortal. I thought to check the file name after reading the previous posts and wondering how I won when so many others lost.

 

[Cactus Pete]

The map -- a great deal of land area, no local AIs, limited happiness resources early, and no early good GP farm sites -- created a long game, especially for anyone going for Domination, which is probably why there are so few submissions. An interesting game, nonetheless, as had to go conquering without superior forces and didn't finish until the 1700's.

The barb island was a creative touch, but I wasn't able to take much advantage of it. Not sure how I could have captured it early on. Did anyone try/succeed at that?

Thanks, kcd.

 

[Xcalibrator]

I really liked this game even though I my two attempts were, respectively, a failure and incomplete. The barb island was very clever, and I'm still not sure the best way to deal with. To respond to Cactus Pete, I didn't take it until (well after) I had cataphants, both times around 650 AD.

In my first game I got the Mids (capital) and Stonehenge (on the southern coast with ivory and fish). My biggest mistake was revolting to Representation, and then stubbornly sticking with it thinking I could fuel my research on Rep-boosted scientists, but Rep just didn't provide enough happiness for enough cities. I was first to Alphabet and traded that around pretty well but I gradually fell farther and farther behind the AI, except for Khan. At 1 AD I had only 4 cities--pretty nice ones but c'mon. Khan eventually DoW'd me, I handled the war very badly, and gave up around 1000 AD when it was clear I'd never win the game.

My second time through I was too late for Stonehenge but again got the Mids and revolted to HeredRule, which should have been the obvious thing to do the first time. I cranked out warriors and archers for happiness and thus eliminated the previous growth bottleneck. I also used my first GP, a Great Eng, to bulb Metal Casting, which let me build The Colossus, which was another major improvement over the first game. Even though I didn't capture the barb island any earlier my empire was in much better overall shape and I was the first to Liberalism, taking Nationalism and rushing the Taj with another Gt Eng, etc. When I stopped around 1000 AD I was first in tech (though not by much over Peter) and couldn't decide between going for Domination (a long hard slog, as CP said) or Space. Either way, I couldn't afford the time to finish, but I enjoyed the challenge very much, and learned again (for the umpteenth time) that you have to play to the map. Thanks, kcd, and congrats to those few who pulled out a win!

 

[kcd_swede]

Thanks for the comments! BTW, I am curious why nobody seemed to take the (to me obvious) strategy of hitching a ride to victory with Permanent Alliance to the leading AI. It's a good thing to try when you are a level or two above your comfort zone, imo.

 

[Cactus Pete]

Frankly, kcd, I wasn't sure how that works with the land possession requirement of Domination. Thought land might either get shared (i.e. cut in half) or pooled (added together). Can you tell me how it works?

 

[kcd_swede]

Frankly, kcd, I wasn't sure how that works with the land possession requirement of Domination. Thought land might either get shared (i.e. cut in half) or pooled (added together). Can you tell me how it works?

I am not 100% sure, but I believe all his and all your land gets counted as yours at 100% value. I don't know for sure since I wouldn't normally recommend a PA for Dom VC ... the AI is often a liability in wars. It can also confound diplo relations, so its best suited if you are aiming for Space where the AI can greatly accelerate your tech. But being able to get all its cash every time you run out is useful in any situation.