GOTM 22 First Spoiler

[dannybe]

Well, got my first GOTM under my belt. I'm not much of a warmonger and usually try to win by another means BUT by warring.

Anyhows, I built my city in place & started building nothing but warriors & archers. Used my worker to build a farm on the floodplains & then went straight for BW & IW with masonry along the way. Started building axeman with barracks & walls I thought I had a good start.

I was allured by the shiney iron mine to west & headed for it with a settler, an axeman & archer in tow. Built my city on top of the iron mine but was over run before my first praet was built. Probably should have ignored the iron mine & built on better site. Retired at 460BC when my Cu mine was destroyed & my lone city was surrounded.

I think my biggest error was going for the iron mine though. I should on a better site, consolidated & kept churning out axemen.

 

[cabert]

Well, got my first GOTM under my belt. I'm not much of a warmonger and usually try to win by another means BUT by warring.

Anyhows, I built my city in place & started building nothing but warriors & archers. Used my worker to build a farm on the floodplains & then went straight for BW & IW with masonry along the way. Started building axeman with barracks & walls I thought I had a good start.

I was allured by the shiney iron mine to west & headed for it with a settler, an axeman & archer in tow. Built my city on top of the iron mine but was over run before my first praet was built. Probably should have ignored the iron mine & built on better site. Retired at 460BC when my Cu mine was destroyed & my lone city was surrounded.

I think my biggest error was going for the iron mine though. I should on a better site, consolidated & kept churning out axemen.

I did the same (almost) thing, and I agree that settling on the iron was not the best thing to do.
In this game, you should only settle on hills, the defensive bonus is soooo necessary.

 

[jesusin]

Put the level above noble and the AI is cheating, put it below noble and the human is cheating. In some sense, all of the equalizer handicaps can be thought of as cheating.

Well, that's different, the difficulty level is based on production bonuses and you choose the level you want to play on.

By the way, Noble level is not fair at all. The human moves before the AIs, so he wins the religion or the free tech or the wonder everytime the human and the AI finish something on the same turn.

 

[lukasbradley]

Embarassingly I was conquered in about 30 turns because I chose to build a worker first and didn't get away with it. In my shock, forgot to grab the auto save so no submit for me on this one.

I forgot to build a second warrior for defense, and lost it within about 20 turns.

Terribly, terribly idiotic.

 

[redemption438]

I think my biggest error was going for the iron mine though. I should on a better site, consolidated & kept churning out axemen.

I think that's true. My game has lasted a long time probably because I put my 2nd city next to the copper, which gave me Rome and Antium as solid production cities easily defended next to each other. Iron city came a bit later and I had enough axes to hold it.

But this was lucky rather than smart... when IW came in, I had a settler ready to go, but the only iron I saw was far north (I hadn't explored west at all). I'm sure if I had seen the desert iron right away, I would have gone for it and been spread too thin... sometimes ignorance is bliss.

In any case, for a game this challenging, it seems like iron but no copper in the starting city location would have been more fair.

 

[AgedOne]

Purely out of interest, of course, I had another crack at this game last night.
At least I managed to prove to myself that it's not an impossible task, trying to get a good game out of this.

I founded Rome to the south-west this time, getting the gold but missing the copper until much later. Founded Antium to get the copper and elephants. I'm not sure whether the start position actually made as much difference as some other very obvious things - like that I knew where the resources and the AI were this time.

This time, I managed to grab a hold of the copper supply which was never shifted. (Actually I only played up to 250BC, so it's a bit early to say "never")
I was able to churn out a goodly number of axes and spears, which I used to ensure the various AI couldn't get through to my cities. Then, with the remainder, I went for Elizabeth - eliminating her around 350BC! I've also managed to get a few hits in on the Chinese and the barbarian cities.

I've also managed to acquire the horses, so I've added chariots to the mixture.

All-in-all it's a reasonable start, and the next test would come with the transition to better units - probably requiring iron. It's reassured me that a game is to be had from this start, and it was only my less than ambitious play that led to a long drawn out siege in my first (and official) attempt. This good news is slightly tarnished by the thought that I just wouldn't have known lots of the useful things if I hadn't played it through once already. Exactly why this is disallowed!

 

[Thalatta]

Wow. (0.75)^^9 pretty slim chance of happening. Enough to make me think "maybe" the odds aren't really 25%. in my case i noticed axemen with the melee promotion against axemen without it (75% or so i think), I've had bad luck, but I didn't lose 9 in a row.

Editied to add: used calculator, not so bad ~7.5% chance to win 9 in a row at 75%

(im assuming u meant u had 25% chance of losing)

The RNG seemed rather forgiving for me, too, actually, assuming my units weren't redlined. I consider that rather kind of it, as I've lost a couple battles listed as "100.1%" odds on vanilla...

 

[Chimera]

I don't think I've been very lucky so far. Settled SW and then figured iron would be nearby so BW-->IW. Built a second warrior and then a second worker (did adventurer) and finally a settler. I happened to see the iron to the west in the desert and settled nearby on a hill that was in range of it and the wheat. Hooked everything up and started cranking out the prats...only problem was I didn't harass any AI's early and now they are swarming in. I'm able to take care of them as long as I don't lose >90% often. I had a couple battles of 4+ upgraded prats or spears loosing to archers or chariots...makes for a very sad game. I did manage to destroy half of Victoria, but I don't think I'll ever be able to get enough units to continue and I'm starting to get out teched.

 

[slurm]

hello all,

played my second gotm contender and lost after 11 turns ( I think you know what happend, damn english archer...)

So replaying it a couple of times cause I wanted to know if one can win this, I think best start is

Settle SW, start warrior
BW (then roads, archery and worker techs)
move warrior straight to london, capture worker from england,
chop second worker, then settler,
second city below ivory,
defend hills with archers and rush england with axes
Iron is at London !! (after you got iron rome and antium should build prets in 4-5 turns)
improve backyard between london and rome. (this is what I missed a little bit)
sent pillaging stacks to monty and genghis (I also missed genghis)

I have at 900 AD 20 Prets, hills at rome guarded and the hordes are coming, but they are running straight to rome which is good defended with 4-5 prets, 2-3 axes, spear and 2 archers .
Because of the hills are guarded (archer spear pret axe) the best tile to attacke is the west tile of rome, which is a grasland, so they allways lose...
But I missed improving my backyard so I`m running out of funds and cant tech... the game is quite a loss.
Also the AI has longbowman, I cant capture cities any more and all but lizzie are still alive...

So Its a quite interesting game very challeging but I think one can win this...

 

[Cletus]

...
move warrior straight to london, capture worker from england,
..

Oh, that sounds good! I never thought it would be so easy, as you seem to indicate. (I'm pretty noobish, even though i've been playing this game for a long time, still lots to learn)

edited to add, i've learned much from reading post here, thanks everyone. I should read more but prefer playing and keep making the same mistakes over and over again.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

move warrior straight to london, capture worker from england,

How is that possible? No way can a warrior capture an archer-defended city. And to capture the worker outside a city, you need to move your warrior next to him first, at which point the AI will retreat the worker.

 

[Cletus]

How is that possible? No way can a warrior capture an archer-defended city. And to capture the worker outside a city, you need to move your warrior next to him first, at which point the AI will retreat the worker.

Maybe there was a road outside the controlled area, so he could move 2?

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Maybe there was a road outside the controlled area, so he could move 2?

lol! Nice idea, that did cross my mind, but Slurm said 'move warrior straight to London' - London is definitely going to be in the controlled area If you're relying on waiting till a worker is on a road outside cultural borders - that seems pretty risky and I doubt it's going to happen till later on at monarch level - I don't recall ever seeing an AI worker outside cultural borders unless there was a 2nd city he was linking a road to or travelling to.

Besides, to use the road to capture the worker, the warrior has to be two squares away along the same road. He must simultaneously be 2 squares from AI cultural borders so that the AI can't see the danger (yet somehow, you have to be able to see the worker so the warrior knows where to go). The road must not cross a river and if the worker is on a hill or there are any hills nearby in AI cultural borders then the warrior and road will have to be even further from the AI borders. That all requires a fair chunk of road outside AI culture, as well as a 2nd unit in a position to see the worker but not to reach it in one turn - an unlikely combination, methinks.

 

[AgedOne]

. . .
move warrior straight to london, capture worker from england,
. . .

I think (and I do not speak slurmish well) that what is meant is this:
In the numerous replay attempts, the best was the one where London was taken by an early warrior attack (probably at crazy odds) - capturing a worker in the process.

 

[slurm]

Well, I wanted to see if I can win this game, so I started it over
a few times... after loosing the first game after 11 turns...

At my second try I wanted to block London from being improved, so if you move inside the cultural borders of a city the AI sends his workers home, then I saw this worker stopped outside London, so I tried to capture it in the third try.
This is a really hard game but very interesting cause I wanted to learn rushes and war.

Capture the worker:
Oh, I dont mean to attack London.

If you look at the map, the Iron Hill at london is 3 tiles away.
If you move from the plains hill outside london to NE, then the worker (who is working the hill) try to move to London.
It stops direkt in front of you and in london are only two archers. None of them comes to protect the worker.
A little sketch (sorry for not making screenshots)

g grasland
w water
I iron hill
p plains hill
L London
Turn one
..............g I<- here is the worker
.......g g w w
....g g g L
.....p g g
....|u are here

Turn two
..................................g I
worker stops-> ...g w w
.......................g g g L
.......................p | g
...........................|u are here

At the next turn you can capture the worker and walk home.
The warrior may fall the next turn, cause the warriors will attack you, but you actually got a new english unused worker
P.S. Beware of the lions on the way home

I think their are no crazy odds, I did it at least 3 times ( my usual start for now )

Hope that clearifys something.

 

[Jove]

Settled SW on the plains hill and produced warriors. We went for Archery first for the defensive value, producing our first archer in 3100BC. Bronze working was next, allowing us to whip our first worker at 2800BC. Only then did we learn Animal Husbandry in 2440.

From there it was the Wheel and then Iron Working, complete in 1600. We had a settler ready when the iron became visible and decided to settle Antium SW of the desert iron.

Our first Prat appeared in 775BC. Up until this point we'd had good luck against the barbs and stray AI units. We mostly fought defense at good odds and sustained surprisingly few casualties. Anyway, in no time we had 4 prats and could capture Nottingham NE of Rome. From there we just kept pushing against England until they were no more, taking London in 220BC.

We'd been busy elsewhere during this time too. Found the troops to raze a weak Aztec city north in the jungle while the rest of our forces moved west. In 400BC the Mongols built the Pyramids in Karakorum and we just had to have that. We first pillaged their iron and gold, then captured the thing along with 2 workers in 250BC. We had killed a wandering settler right at this time too, so there's 3 free workers, plus what we stole from England- not bad really.

We had Mysticism by this time, so Karakorum whipped and obelisk for defense and to claim more tiles. More troops moved to capture Bebshalik south of Karakorum while some new prats captured the chinese town of Xian N of Rome. So, we expanded into 2 capitols plus several towns East, West and North, captured the Pyramids, switched to Police State and razed a couple AI towns all by 100BC.

If only we'd played a test game...
Things were going a little too well I think. Karakorum had 3 prats and several other units on its hill behind the river and was whipping more units. I thought it'd be safe, so we built a settler in Rome to found Cumae to work sheep and gold etc. in former Mongolia. Only I wasn't prepared for the volume of AI units that were to swarm us. Wave after wave meant Karakorum fell to the Japanese in 230AD. Cumae and Beshbalik both fell a few turns after that. None of these towns was particularly productive if you don't count the Pyramids, but now our western front is at Antium the Iron town. Drat! If we'd focused on holding Karakorum instead of building a settler it would have held. At least for this round...

The good news is that the new line is holding and were making progress against the Aztecs. We captured a major town with Ivory and Gems from them in 395. By 500 though our Iron has been pillaged and the import from England is not back online. We've got about 10 towns or so, we have Construction, and we're making some forward progress. Maybe we'll drive West again. On the downside the science rate is just abysmal- less than 20bpt most turns. Wish me luck.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

If you look at the map, the Iron Hill at london is 3 tiles away.
If you move from the plains hill outside london to NE, then the worker (who is working the hill) try to move to London.
It stops direkt in front of you and in london are only two archers. None of them comes to protect the worker.

Ah, thanks Slurm! Yes, that clarifies it. You were taking advantage of the iron being on a peninsula so there wasn't really anywhere for the worker to go without going past you. Plus a good dose of AI stupidity I'm sure any human would've seen the danger coming and taken measures to protect the worker.

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

Here’s my spoiler from looking at my turn log, I’m still alive at 500AD and have killed Monty and Qin. But that still leaves 6 bloodthirsty AI’s…

I settled SW on the plains hill and built a warrior first. My initial warrior scouted to the west and south and I researched hunting --> animal husbandry --> archery. My warrior finished on turn 9, the same time as I met an Aztec scout and English archer. I made another warrior before making a worker. I made another warrior and started on some archers. I quickly improved gold and pigs and my units stayed inside my borders to guard my improvements and fight with high odds.

Next task was Bronzeworking --> Ironworking. I made two archers before getting a settler. Antium was founded on the plains hill to the NE in range of the cows (share with Rome), bronze and ivory. I built archers in both cities and a barracks in Rome. I build more archers from Rome while bronze is getting connected. I see that Iron is not in my workable land, doh. Iron to the west looks like a miserable city, and I am having some success with my current border defence, so I decide to go for the iron to the north that looks more defensible. Still I am defending inside my borders and have not yet lost a unit. Build a second worker and even more archers before finally starting axemen in both cities around 1400BC. I fear that I’ve left missed the chance for early attack, and know how important it is to weaken a couple of AI’s before they get up and running… but I press on.

I make four axemen to raze the Aztec city near the northern Iron and make a settler to claim it for myself. My axemen get lucky and both win at 60% odds to let me continue my war party. I continue to build axemen.

My research now is wheel --> pottery --> writing --> math

Nottingham is founded by England next to horses on my eastern border and is my next target. I attack and keep Nottingham and have a few axes near Monty to kill a size 1 city with a single archer.

My iron gets hooked up in 820BC and I build 4 Praetorians before a chinese city steals my iron with culture expansion across the skinny northern lake, so its back to more axes.

I move to Montys capital, take it and keep it losing 1 praet and 2 axes. Then I take another Aztec city and raze it, losing 1 more praet.

I keep churning axes with a few useful buildings in between. My next target is Qin’s Guangzhou that has cultural pressure on my iron. I loze two axes and raze the city to regain my iron mine, and my Praet builds crank up again.

I’m going for construction now but my research is pretty broken with all the units I am maintaining.

All this time I am keeping units back for defence to continue killing AI units with favourable odds.

Once I make some more city raider praets I move to Beijing as Qin has Pyramids. 130BC I take Beijing, losing 3 axes and keep it. I kill a Chinese size 1 city with a single archer inside and move further west towards Nanjing which has Stonehenge. I take Nanjing easily now with promoted praets and decide to keep the city for Stonehenge benefit, although it is pretty far from Rome and my economy is diving. I figure that if I can just hold it for 15 turns then my secondary cities back near Rome can get a free border expansion. Also, having a city on the western front will help distract AI units from my homeland around Rome. For the next few turns my main force stops to heal and repel the ai forces flooding to my captured Chinese cities.

On the eastern front, Monty is sending out settlers and archers from his last main city and I routinely raze two of his infant settlements.

I’ve finished construction 125AD and now start the long haul from mysticism through to code of laws. Time to start building war elephants, who are great at border defence, and a few catapults. I finally make use of the Pyramids and change civics to Police State.

There is one Chinese city left, so since I am this far into the continent I choose to send troops to eliminate Qin. First civ eliminated 185AD as I raze the last Chinese city.

My attack force now moves south to try to wound Genghis Khan. I manage to capture and raze two Mongolian cities (one is the Confucian holy city, but I already have excessive city upkeep so it gets razed too) before taking my force home to heal and then move against England.

The ex-Chinese cities are under heavy fire and acting like magnets for the AI units crossing the continent towards Rome.

Before 500AD I manage to capture and keep the last Aztec city next to gems, horses and ivory to eliminate Monty and also raze one English city on the plains.

By now I have 8 cities and maintenance is a killer. One city is marginal near the northern iron and two ex-chinese cities are unlikely to hold for very long under constant attack. My goal is to consolidate now and make every effort to scrape my research through to code of laws by putting up cottages where I can. It’s been 25 turns since I started mysticism and it’s going to be 2 more before I learn it!

I want to critically wound England and maintain a “magnet” city somewhere in the west to distract the AI’s as long as possible to prevent Rome being overrun by the untouched Spain, Germany, France and Japan.

I’ve found this game very entertaining, and I feel lucky to have survived the first 30 turns so I can make a game of it. I’ve always been on my toes surveying the map each turn making sure I have the right counter defence for all the barb and ai units flooding in. On the aggressive front it has been a very difficult balancing act, knowing that I HAVE to attack while Praets are dominant but knowing that I have to keep some behind for defence too. Then there is the usual debate about which cities to take and then whether to raze or keep!

 

[GreatDeceiver]

We could have a winner! You're looking good Jimmy Thunder. Of all the posts so far, it seems to me that you have the best chance of pulling this one out. If anything will do you in, it might be the slow rate of research you mentioned in your post. Good luck!

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

Hah! I don't know about winner

If i've managed to survive then all the regular faces at the top of the GOTM tables will have managed much more!

I'm still playing through my game and certainly will give it my best, thanks!

PS: And check Drphil's game on page 3, post #51. He is doing very very well.