GOTM 163 Spoiler

[Major Advantage]

Since I am no contender for the green star, here is the final part of my log.

I beefed up my defense before starting the space race with a battleship, an alpine, a marine, and a tank. They were useful as blockers but saw very little action. This was in no small part due to geography. The lake by Beijing helped a lot and so did the swamps and jungles around its perimeter. Romans sent nearly a dozen diplomats my way but they could not find a way to penetrate my perimeter. They brought in cavalry and cannons too but never used them against my defenses. The English sent only a soldier or two because they were busy dealing with barbarians. I built the battleship in case they try a naval attack from their mainland and they never did. Egyptians were friendly till the end and even offered alliance right before the end which I accepted. Vikings were too weak and too far to matter all game.

I also finished, a few days ago. I think I did pretty well, being behind in city size, wonder construction and 5-6 techs all the time, I was only behind 5 turns when it came to launch.
My endgame was rather boring. English grew very powerful, so I chose to ally with them rather than with Rome (was nominal at war with them, but they were never ante portas), so England would not attack me. I had to give them some techs, but they never joined the space race. In the end, I built some more wonders for score and eventually also got a lot of peace-points for score.


1010 demo(revolt&est.)->gunpowder(782); Stock exchange built; get 50g and feudalism from Rome
1030 Gunp.->Magnetism
1060 Magn.->Explosives
1090 Expl.->Steam; get steam engine from Rome
1100 Reserarch Metallurgy; a lot of barb activity west of us
1120 Metall->Railroad(819); delivery 348
1130 French want us to join their war with England, we decline, alliance holds
1140 Delivery 332 (dye to egypt, but every city drops out of demand)
1150 Railroad->Electricity
1180 Electr.->Industy(861)
1190 Newton College
1200 Ind->Corporation(882)
1210 Missed Corporation because of Barb archer on silk
1220 Corp.->Refining
1250 Refining->Steel() delivery 616
1260 Steel->Combustion
1280 Comb->Automobile(966); factory built
1300 Auto->Mass prod.
1310 Superhighways
1320 MassPrd.->Conscription
1330 50g from Rome
1340 Conscr.->Electronics
1360 Electron.->Refrigeration
1370 Mass transport
1380 Refr.->Chivalry
1390 Hail England to get chivalry, they want 250g from us! We agree and get chivalry from them
(England turns to fundamentalism! We had planned to buy some engineers from them. French cancel alliance as we refuse to join their war with england)
1400 We missed leadership! shift of key-civ?
1410 Leadership->Tactics(1272); delivery 510
1420 Tactics->Machine tools
(Egyptians develop communism and cancel Marco)
1430 7 vans (5*hides) and 1 dip on their way to England
1440 Mach tools->Communism; get communism from Egypt
1450 Research Mini
1460 Mini->Computers(1368); deliv. 366; bribe english engineer for 1780g
(English are at war with Rome, what did they have for breakfast?)
1470 offshore platform
(French civ destroyed by england)
1480 Computers->Espionage(1508); delivery 744
1490 Espio->Atomic(1534); Science Lab built; deliv 399
1500 Atomic->Nucl. fission(1560); 399

Stats at 1500AD:
city size: 19; techs: 61; gov: Demo; gold: 4197; city buildings: Library, Market place, aquaeduct, bank, university, sewer, harbour, public transport, stock exchange, superhighways, science lab, offshore platform; Marco Polo, Coloccus, Shakespeare, Copernicus, Newton
trade routes: 3; units: 1 settler, 2 engineers, 2 archers, 1 horse, 8 vans, 1 boat, 1 dip

1510 Fission->NPower(1586); 432
1515 Npower->Flight; 2*432
(More barbs uprising west of us)
1520 Flight->Laser
1525 Nuclear Plant; bribe barb musceteer for 61, kill cannon with it
1530 Bribe cannon for 82, kill musceteer with it
1535 Laser->Radio
1540 Supermarket built
1545 English hail us, since they were getting too powerful we decide to ally with them rather than with Rome, get 150g gift
1550 Radio->Adv. Flight; baracks built
1555 Restart celebrations
1560 City walls
1565 Adv. Flight->Rocketry(1848); deliv. 348
1580 Rockets->Recycling
1595 Recycling->Space; Recycling center; bribe barb dragoon (none) 102g, take barb leader with it for 100
1605 England builds UN
1610 Space->Plastics
1615 Apollo built; begin spaceship
1625 Englich hail us and demand tactics, granted, ask for gift, get pottery
1630 Plastics->Amph. warf.
1635 Embassy with England, they are republic now
1650 Amph->Supercond.; could bribe egypt engineer for 356, but do not need it any more
1660 Embassy with Egypt, was planning to buy some defenders, but there are none available
1670 Supercond.->Fusion
1680 Bribe egypt dip for 103
1690 15 structure complete, 100g from hut on island 13;
1700 Fusion->Environmet
1705 100g from hut on island 9;
(England demands adv. flight, granted, ask for gift, get monotheism)
1710 100g from island 10
1720 3 sets of components completed
1735 Standard spaceship completed! Launch it now or take the risk and go for a bigger ship? 8 more structures, 4 more components and 3 more modules, so at least 15 more turns, we have only 1212g and 4 vans left, so probably more turns... play it safe and launch now, keep the save for an alternative ending
1740 Env->FT1
1742 Eiffel Tower built; delivery for 456
1744 SETI built, Science Lab sold
1745 FT1->Guerilla, cancel science
1747 GW built
1748 drop off van in England, get hailed, give plastics, get mob. warf. as gift, van delivered for 432
1749 Lighthouse built
1750 The eagle has landed

 

[Ali Ardavan]

320 - Germans annihilated. No blue civ has been spawned.
360 - Thebes and Heliopolis fall.
380 - Elephantine falls and Egyptians are out. Immediately Aztecs show up and declare war against French. So the blue has spawned after all, they just didn't build their city yet. I guess they need to build at least one city to show up on my diplomacy screen.
EDIT: Nope, Aztecs appeared on the diplomatic screen despite not having any cities.

In my limited experience (I play space ship more often that conquest), the respawn can happen at two different times: 1. immediately after a civ is eliminated and 2. after you end your turn and before you start your next turn. I am not sure what (if anything) causes one method to prevail over the other but regardless the respawn will be in your diplomacy screen if you have Marco or UN. I am guessing that your French showed up between turns and that is why you missed them initially.

 

[Peaster]

Hi Gang! It is always great to see you are still fighting the good fight. Especially nice to see old-timer Grigor playing for EC again on a small map. Ali, you are surely number 1 in the Hall now. Congratulations! Also, nice to see that many of the logs now include the player's goals.

I am playing for conquest, maybe for Gold, maybe for Green, depending on my time and stamina this month. I plan on about 40 cities, aiming to conquer in 200AD or so. If I had known Grigor was playing, I might have gone only for Green.

-4000 hut = chariot
-3950 hut = Archer, which will disband for shields soon.
-3850 Beijing(1) on grass
-3650 hut = nomad. Very nice, though it must delay citying for the size 1 trick.
-3450 Size 1 settler Beijing
-3400 Shanghai(2) on the north coast, from the nomad. Researching cb, 40%.
-3300 Canton(3), to East, near whales.
-3200 hut = hbr.
-3000 Raise Science to 60%. Goals = monarchy + 6 cities asap. cb --> cl.

-2700 Bei So(4) and Shang SE(5). Soon we start a few roads, and cl-->moy.
-2350 moy-->curr. Bei No(6).
-2250 Monarchy begins. hut = AT = Chengdu(7). Soon "Vikings def. English"
-2000 Stats: 8 cities, monarchy, 4Sett+1chariot, 6adv @cur, no AI contact.
Goals: MM, Trade, Poly. Approx 12 cities asap. Expansion.

-1950 [etc] Huts = AT, MM, Trade (lucky sequence). Learn of the Spanish.
-1750 [approx] Small war with Rome. Outposts must RB warriors. 10 cities. Start on vans for WoWs.
-1500 Stats: 12 cities, 4S, 3v, new goals = boats, MPE, 1 barracks.

-1350: MPE Maybe I should've delayed this in favor of faster growth. It fetches 3 maps, pots and writing. The 4 AIs have 9 cities total.
-1000 Stats: 18 cities, monarchy, 128g, 12adv, @Lit, 5S+2tri+6misc. MPE. Still at war with Rome, just contact with other 3 AI. Mfg 60. Pop 400K.
Next goals: 40 cities by 1AD, covering most of the map. Approx 10-15 boats. Conquer Spain 1st, to reveal the respawn zone(s). Probable WoW's = HG, Pyr, LH as needed. Also consider Republic, overseas van trade, tribute.

 

[grigor]

Hi Peaster. I bow down in wonder.
I got a hut with CB early (AT in 2700) so I went for Monarchy in 2650. You got a nomad early and got 8 cities by 2000 and (Monarchy in 2250). Wow. I need to try your early tax plan. I never quite have the guts to put off science until 3000.

I suspect you are right about delaying Marco for growth. I find (from my games and observing others) that Marco in 1100 or 1150 is usually optimal, and building it earlier doesn't help the tech tree enough. Building later usually means you have to give somebody an annoying tech (like Monotheism) to get maps. I don't know if there was a study done - the crucial nature of Marco was only appreciated at the end of the initial Apolyton studies.

I wanted 20 cities by 1000 but was only able to achieve 13. And I am sure you have more triremes

 

[Ali Ardavan]

Hi Gang! It is always great to see you are still fighting the good fight. Especially nice to see old-timer Grigor playing for EC again on a small map.

It is very nice to see you back Peaster, and Grigor too, even if it is occasional.

Ali, you are surely number 1 in the Hall now. Congratulations!

Thanks. Officially you are still number 1, but if the hall of fame was in synch with graded submissions then I believe I would pass you by a little bit.
That is added incentive for you to be around here more often: to regain your long-held crown.

Also, nice to see that many of the logs now include the player's goals.

I second that. I found it useful for myself as well when I go back to a game after a long pause of a week or more.

 

[Peaster]

You got a nomad early and got 8 cities by 2000 and (Monarchy in 2250). I need to try your early tax plan. I never quite have the guts to put off science until 3000.

Thanks for your reply, grigor. I miss these conversations about civ2 strategy!

I think a high tax rate is a Slowthinker idea, or maybe just part of ICS mentality. The beakers come faster after you have a few cities, so a delay is no problem. Though I do recall a few games where this went very very wrong. I had good hut luck in this game, especially with the early nomad, which probably accounts for 2-3 of my 2000BC cities.

I suspect you are right about delaying Marco for growth. I find (from my games and observing others) that Marco in 1100 or 1150 is usually optimal ... I don't know if there was a study done...

I think there is and was a feeling that Marco should be among the first WoWs built, but I don't know any rule of thumb about when to build it. I usually build WoW#1 when I have about 10 cities, and a few roads for the vans, and I can afford to do it. 1100BC sounds good for this map. Marco costs 200s, which is worth more than the 2 techs I got from it. It is hard to put a value on seeing the AI maps and civ-info. When the first flotillas are leaving this is VERY valuable, but in my game Marco came way before that, so I think I was too early.

I wanted 20 cities by 1000 but was only able to achieve 13. And I am sure you have more triremes

Yes, I love triremes. In this game, I have built a long N-S road and have not gone in for van trade. Also, it is a small map, so I have fewer triremes than usual. At 500BC I have only 9, but I will aim for approx 20 soon, to prepare for respawning.

@Ali: Your crown will be safe from me ! For now, I can only play 1-2 gotms a year, and I usually enjoy playing for Green more than for Gold.

Some stats at 500BC (more log to come asap): 40 cities, pop 950K, monarchy, MPE/HG/STzu. Spain(yellow) destroyed, War with Eng+Romans (both capitols razed), and only "contact" with Viks. 19adv, Chiv --> Myst this turn.

Units: 8S, 5ele, 9tri, 14 misc. I have not made many ele's lately, waiting for SunTzu and Chivalry.

Goals: Not sure. If going for Green, I will aim for Trondheim and build up the army+navy asap, + maybe LH. If going for Gold, I will build Pyrs, research towards Republic, and turn up ICS briefly.

 

[Ali Ardavan]

@Ali: Your crown will be safe from me ! For now, I can only play 1-2 gotms a year, and I usually enjoy playing for Green more than for Gold.

I much rather lose the crown and have you play more often.

 

[Blasph23]

From reading all of your partial logs, I can deduct what mistakes I've made in my own game.
Too few triremes at a crucial moment and my conquest lagged ~200 years because of that.
Also, I should have settled more as I had every chance to fill the continent with cities.
I'm just used to playing with fewer cities as I don't like the micromanagement after ~16-20 cities. Truth be told, conquest doesn't require that much micromanagement, especially early on, so the next time I'll unleash the ICS.

The biggest mistake was not attacking Rome with a combined force and instead letting elephants destroy themselves against the river cities in threes and fours.
Then, whatever was left got destroyed by the next Roman unit.
I just thought they could pull it off.
Only after some conquests elsewhere (Viks and Egyptians), I was able to commit the triremes with more elephants and attack at once but the damage has been done.
Trying to destroy the Romans bogged me down for 500 years and here we are.

Still, I'm not a particularly big fan of early conquests and though familiar with the strategy, I have much to learn in this department.

 

[catalin72]

Game submitted.

1953 AD,112 cities +Heliopolis in revolt,subverted.11 engi none,more bribed after 1871,7 cities in the glacier border,size (15-23),a mistake in a game resource tile,I forgot in that moment,oasis will be buffalo,not wheat...,can't make desert again ).
1875 AD-Space Flight stolen,no war declared.They not have Metallurgy,but have Space Flight....
1876 AD-Last sneak attack,peace 1889 AD-1953 AD

 

[Peaster]

I had to finish up abruptly to meet the deadline (and am too busy to play for gold anyway). Apologies for briefly posting my save here, but I couldn't find any other way to get the file out of my Win98 machine, which won't cooperate with flash drives or email today.

I think I last posted at -500, with 40 cities and 2-3 civs on the way down. I planned to defeat the Vikings around 1AD, down to 1 pet city, and then play out 5-10 turns in Republic to drive up my score. Things went faster than that. There were no respawns and the Vikings were down to 1 by -200. But I was out of RL time and energy. I actually hate playing the Republic phase, which is all work and no play, and found I'd rather fill out my tax return. So, played a bit past -200 today to finish up a WoW and bought off the last Vikings still in the BC years. Highlights:

-500: SunTzu, London down, Chivalry.
-475: Hut = Republic but never used. Begin risky trireme jumps to Vikingland from the NorthEast, eg from England which was essentially defeated. I had Seafaring and had not found the safer route from the North, and did not have boats in place to the West/NW yet.
-400: Romans down with no respawn. The chariot I got from a hut in -4000 did most of the work, picking off wandering Roman units for 20 turns or so, while we bulked up, and then leading the final charge on Veii. IIRC it also cracked the defenses at Trondheim a bit later. Also, England went down this turn, leaving only the Viks. I have invaded their lands, mainly with Settlers, but am not quite ready to attack there.
-375: Vik's sneak attack my warrior and win, but I am happy to have war.
-350: buy Memphis from the Viks. It was far NE of the other Vik cities, so now the target is much smaller. One newer city is not visible yet, but I have enough units nearby to find it by triangulation soon. I increase Science to 70% trying for Mono/MC by about 1AD (which never happens).
-300: I am surprised by sea barbs invading my homeland. I haven't played much lately and just forgot about these guys. I have zero defensive units and no good ideas, but fortunately only have approx 150g. They offer to go way for 75g or so. We have 56 cities now.
-250: Ellies and our ancient super-chariot defeat Trondheim, and the Viks quickly go downhill. These units were mostly shipped in from the Roman zone, though with 50-60 cities now, some units are flowing in from all over the world.
-200: We find the last missing city, Hladir, with a diplomat and [probably] could have bribed it to end the game, but instead keep it as a pet as planned.

I guess I will stop here. My last few turns really make no strategical sense, as I was abruptly switching from a "Gold" style game to a "Green" style. I made some settlers, but then had them rejoin the cities that birthed them. I did build LH near the end and raised Lux to 70% for a few extra points. I am mostly happy with the game. I had good luck with huts and respawns (none) and didn't make any costly mistakes, except maybe my indecision over the main goal.

Comment on respawns: I have found that I often get loads of respawns (20 is not unusual) and often get almost none. I sometimes get an average number (like 10) but not as often as the extremes. Do you agree with this observation ? If so, this suggests that respawns are not statistically independent. In this gotm, my first 4 civs did not respawn, so I was counting on the Vikings staying dead too, which did in fact happen. Of course you cannot reason this way with coin tosses, but you can sometimes with non-independent events. If they had respawned, I did have cities covering most of the map, to help hunt the new guys down, but I did not have a large navy (only 13 boats) or a large army (maybe 10-15 ellies, mostly near the Viking lands) and obviously I had not ID'd a respawn zone.

 

[Blasph23]

When I was wrapping things up in my game, Celts were the last civ.
I destroyed them and got the usual conquest screen.
However, after sending the save to gotm staff, I played it again and sure enough, Russians spawned when Celts were destroyed.
After Russians, no other respawns.
One more reload and once again Celts were the last civ.
After a fourth reload, I had to destroy Celts, then Russians, Romans and Celts again.
So I guess the chance to have a particular color of civ respawn is random and you might have hit a lucky streak.

As for the respawns that did occur, I decided to leave an easily accessible part of the map unsettled, to force respawns in that area and I was successful.
All the respawns I had took place in or around two sectors: (18, 46) and (11, 45).
This allowed for quick and easy access with triremes carrying elephants.

 

[Peaster]

Blasp23: I agree with most of what I read in your posts. It sounds like you were unlucky in some attacks; 3 or 4 vet ellies should be enough against a river city in this setting (King level, before 500AD etc). Not sure why, but the defenses seem to get tougher as the game goes on. Probably vet defenders become more likely and AI tech advances allow better units, such as phalanxes instead of warriors.

I agree that respawns are at least partly random. People experimented with that quite a lot on the Apolyton site, though I don't know of any very useful conclusion from those studies. But [for example ] in some games it seems to me that the chances are around 10% each time and in other games 90%. I'm wondering if others feel the same, or maybe it is my imagination.