GOTM 23 First Spoiler

[sidiousstone]

I haven’t played CIV for a while, I thin I’ve only submitted 2 GOTM…but my New Years Resolution is to submit GOTM more regularly AND provide a write up. Fredrick seemed primed to do a cultural Victory, so that is what I did.

Goal One, Establish three good cities quickly to become my Cultural Standards.
Goal Two, chose an early whipping boy to be my buffer state
Goal Three, first couple cities focus would be population

I settled in place and immediately went the Agri/AH/BW
Aptly named; Hilltop
My initial build was wkr/war/war/set

I sent my scout east, first warrior went south, second warrior went east

3010 I converted to Slavery
2530 Settled Second City on western coast snagging crabs, corn and gold
Named: West Coast
2080 Settled Third city south on land bridge in China’s part. My idea was that Rome had metal, China didn’t. China would be my whipping boy and this city was ideal for developing early military lots of hills and farmable land.
Named: Southern Hills
1900 stole first warrior from china
1120 2nd city finished Stonehenge
955 stole second warrior from china
880 discovered Confucianism
865 built the Oracle in my Capital and got the slingshot to CS
685 stole third warrior from china
670 founded fourth city NW of Capital with corn and sheep in the fat cross – this is to become my new military center
Named: Northern Hills
370 completed the Parthenon in my Capital
Started building economy
110 city five was founded on the NW coast, snagging marble, fish, and crabs (cottage spam)
Named: Northern Banks
110 AD built the Great Lib in Southern Hills (city) three
185 AD Capture Barb city on SE coast getting cows and wine (cottage spam)

By 500AD my hold on my land mass was secure and I had a powerful city sitting on top of China. China was my whipping boy, while I made nice with JC opening borders and sending in missionaries to all his cities.

I'll get a map shot up shortly

 

[Harbourboy]

Note to self: Game of the Month is not the same as Hall of Fame. If you try the same extremist tactics that work in Hall of Fame, you will be carved up for dinner in the more balanced Game of the Month, even on Noble level.

At 500 AD I have 6 cities, but almost no army. Louis is currently pillaging the crap out of my land with poxy horse archers because I have no spearmen. I do have stacks of culture, not that that is much help right now.

 

[Harok]

Goal - Fast Conquest using Chariots early and Horse archers after.

Settled in place and started with a Worker first. Considering my goal and with a cow in the fat cross starting with AH was a no brainer. I needed to locate horses as quickly as possible. I went with BW next for chopping and slavery. This timed out perfectly as my worker was able to work the cow, mine the hill south of the city and move into a forest on same turn as BW came in so he could do some chopping. I researched Wheel next and he was able to go on road duty after that. Moving troops to the frontlines is very important when going for fast military wins.

As we all know the flaw with my plan was the fact that we had no horses anywhere near us. And with no copper either no easy way to go get the closest source of it. So I researched Archery next and went to the Archer rush tactics. After Archery I researched Agriculture and then Horseback riding figuring I could still do most of my plan I would just have to substitute archers instead of chariots early on.

My builds were:
Worker
Warrior
Barracks (switched to Settler when a chop would come in)
Settler
Worker (chop went into speeding this)
Archer after Archer after Archer

I settled Hamburg to the NE on top of the wine so it could get the Corn, Sheep, and 3 hills. It built a barracks and then archer after archer after archer. I would whip both cities whenever they reached a point where a citizen was working a weak/unimproved tile.

My scout went east and my warrior went west/south. My warrior quickly got stuck near Mao's land and camped out near his resources and waited for workers to show up. I first declared on him in 1960BC and called a Cease Fire in 1540BC. The worker I stole roaded part of the way and then returned home to improve some tiles. I declared again on him in 910BC and again got a Cease Fire in 790BC. Just a couple turns later another worker showed up and I declared in 730BC to steal it but this time I also had some archers on the way to do some city taking.

On the eastern front I sent all my early archers toward Julius and when a settler with an archer and warrior showed up I declared on him in 1270BC to turn it into worker which started roading back towards the homefront. I was keeping my eye on Julius's copper and it had no road but when I entered his lands I found he had axes and spears from a second source of copper. That severly slowed me down but I lured them out into the open by sacrificing a single archer next to my stack then I would take it out. I went and disconnected his other copper and he was a pushover once he had no more axes and spears and in 745 BC he was eliminated. I kept his sweet capital and razed his other city. I chopped and whipped a settler from Hamburg and settled Munich in 625 BC on top of the horse so it came online right away.

I immediately started building/whipping horse archers as quickly as possible. Workers would improve the best 3 or 4 tiles for a city and then build roads. On the other end of the world Mao had been so weakened by my worker stealing that he was gone very quickly once I finally attacked his cities and he was gone in 790BC.

I won't reveal the other civs but on both ends I basically moved from one civ onto the next and razed all cities except the capitals which would whip a barracks and then contribute to the war effort. [EDITED - I put in the civ names since it is past the deadline]Workers continued to road, chop every tree, and improve a few tiles and then they became fog busters or tried to lure defenders out of cities.

I declared war next in 340BC and finished Louis in 95AD.
I declared war in 160BC and finished Monte in 170AD.
I declared war in 170AD and finished Washington in 455AD.
I declared war in 290AD and finished Elizabeth in 455AD.

Giving me a conquest victory in 470AD for a pathetic 37000ish points. I sloppily lost one of my cities to a barb on the final turn when I forgot to upgrade the warrior protecting it to an axe.

Some interesting things about the game, for the majority of the game I was running a negative economy even if at 0% research (-50 or so at the end) but cash from taking cities kept me from going on strike although it was close a couple of times. I started researching towards Construction after getting Horseback Riding but quickly realized I would never get close to finishing it so I better finish everyone before cats were needed. Almost no wonders were built, I think only Stonehenge although I would have to go back and see if I razed any but I don't think so.

 

[jesusin]

Well done, Harok. Nice game and nice write-up.

If I may ask, how did you deal with spears in 60% culture defense cities?

 

[Harok]

I didn't face any Spears in 60% cities, the most was 40%. The way I dealt with them was by first trying to draw them out with exposed workers or a unit, but that only worked a couple of times. Next I would suicide old archers or my weakest horse archers losing to them a couple of times before they would be weak enough to take out with more promoted units. I usually cut off copper and iron asap when attacking a civ so they couldn't keep building them also.

 

[Gnejs]

Excellent play, Harok!

I think our strategies were almost* identical, but you seem to have avoided all the stupid moves I did after capturing Rome and instead played a really solid game. Hats off!


*I never built any settler, going directly for archers instead.

 

[Harbourboy]

Brilliant game Harok. I am in awe.

 

[toller pretzl]

I first declared on him in 1960BC and called a Cease Fire in 1540BC. The worker I stole roaded part of the way and then returned home to improve some tiles. I declared again on him in 910BC and again got a Cease Fire in 790BC.

Could someone explain to me the pro's and cons of a cease fire versus a peace treaty ? Up till now I've always gone for a peace treaty, assuming that with a cease fire it would automatically be war again after a time period, whereas with a peace treaty I could choose when to start the war again.

 

[Lexad]

Ceasefire does not allow any war reparations, but you can redeclare war anytime.

 

[Vynd]

Up till now I've always gone for a peace treaty, assuming that with a cease fire it would automatically be war again after a time period

I don't think cease fires expire, or if they do, they don't result in the war resuming. Lexad has already pointed out the big benefit of a cease fire, which is that you can attack again whenever you want instead of being forced to remain peaceful for the 10 turns of a pece treaty.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Entry Class: Challenger

By trying the Challenger Class, I had a few extra obstacles to overcome:
1. I did not start with a Scout unit, so, I had no early knowledge of the map
2. I began the game with no technologies, so, I had to plan my tech path very carefully
3. Three nearby Forest squares were converted into Jungle squares, giving me less good squares for my citizens to work and giving me less flexibility for lass-minute production boosts from Forest chops

Faced with these obstacles, I felt that planning out my tech path would be the most crucial challenge to overcome.

Practice and Planning
I began by trying out a few strategies on the practice map--thanks, JungleIII!

I resolved to settle in place, in order to avoid wandering around for a few turns with only my Settler to uncover new territory.

I initially found a synergy with researching Agriculture -> Hunting -> Animal Husbandry -> Archery -> The Wheel -> Mining. I could begin by building a Worker, a Warrior, and then a Settler. My Worker could improve some land so that the Settler would be produced faster. My Warrior would find a spot for me to settle my second city. Next, I could get out some early Archers, building them from both cities. I felt that maybe I could send out some Archer raiding parties and pillage the lands of the various AI, while having “scouting units” (Archers) that would easily stand up to a lot of the early Barbarian units.

I soon scrapped this plan, however, as I found that I wouldn’t have enough knowledge of the map near my starting location. I couldn’t rely on being able to find a good city location by the time that I had my first Settler ready to go. Further, if I lost a fight to a Barb unit, I’d be struggling to defend my empire with too few units. Given such a shaky plan, I decided that it was too risky for an XOTM game.

The Early Game
Instead, I went for the following research path:
Agriculture -> Animal Husbandry -> Mining -> The Wheel -> Hunting -> Archery

In this way, I was able to keep my Worker busy for most of the time, although he had a few turns of break time while waiting for some of the early Worker Techs to be researched. I made more units by making Warriors instead of Archers and thus, I was able to easily stake out a location for my second city. I was also able to send out a Warrior in either direction, which helped to locate future city locations and to find a couple of the AI.

My build order was relatively conservative, with me building:
Worker -> Warrior -> Warrior -> Warrior -> Settler

I did not get the luck that some had--Mao did not provide me with any opportunities for stealing a Worker. I think that the Barbs must have hit him up hard, as I was not able to get a Worker from Mao until I captured his last city.

The first Warrior which I sent to Julius was terrified to report that Julius was employing Axemen in his army. Despite this fact, I was daring enough to capture his Worker with my Warrior. Julius’ Axeman was hot on my Warrior’s tail, but I had just enough time to pillage Julius’ Gold Mine for 17 Gold! After that point, I ran away with the Warrior and Worker until Julius cornered me. I ended up disbanding the Worker rather than letting Julius reclaim it.

My Initial Cities
Here are the dates of when I founded my first few cities:
Turn 53/660 (2410 BC) Hamburg was founded to the west near Clam, Corn, and Gold
Turn 88/660 (1360 BC) Munich was founded to the north east and then farther east, with Fish, Clam, Marble, and a Flood Plains square
Turn 96/660 (1120 BC) Cologne was founded to the north east, with Sheep, Wine, and Corn
Turn 104/660 (940 BC) Frankfurt was founded to the south west near Corn, Wine, and a Flood Plains square
Turn 121/660 (685 BC) Essen was founded to the east near Wine, Cow, and a Flood Plains square

The Oracle
I wasn’t up for building any early Wonders until I saw the Marble. I didn’t have a lot of production in my capital, but my second city had a decent amount of production potential, so, I decided to build The Oracle there. Thanks to our Cultural Trait, I was able to plop down City #3 (Munich) with the Marble in the outer portion of the city's fat cross and still get the Marble within my borders in a timely fashion.

Since I was not able to chop many Forests near my capital, I delayed researching Bronze Working for quite some time. As such, I wasn’t in a great position for grabbing my favourite tech to take with The Oracle, which is Metal Casting. Civil Service sounds good on paper, but for three things:
1. I had a relatively slow tech start, by starting with zero technologies
2. By having a Jungle on my Silk square, the best square that my first citizen could work netted me 2 Food and 1 Hammer. I’d therefore missed out on 1 Commerce per turn that others could obtain by working the Silk square
3. I settled a lot of cities early on, which cost me a lot of Commerce in maintenance. So, my tech pace wasn’t really great

As a result, I decided to go for Feudalism from The Oracle.

I had to continue avoiding research on Bronze Working in order to get enough beakers to make this gambit work. I already had Archery, so, I felt that I could defend myself with Archers and then could upgrade some of those Archers once I’d researched Feudalism.

Reaping the Rewards of The Oracle
The gambit worked:
On Turn 121/660 (685 BC), Hamburg finishes: The Oracle

By Turn 143/660 (355 BC), I had my first three Longbowmen.

On Turn 155/660 (175 BC), I declared war on Mao.

By Turn 169/660 (35 AD), I had captured 3 Chinese cities, razed one, and eliminated Mao.

Further War Efforts
I researched Construction on Turn 179/660 (185 AD) and promptly began adding War Elephants and Catapults to my army.

It took me a while to get going again, but on Turn 193/660 (395 AD), I declared war on Julius.

As of 500 AD, I had captured 2 Roman cities and razed one. I has also just declared war on the AI past China.

The Current Situation
At this point, none of the AI who I had met knew Feudalism. Praetorians looked scary, but with one of Julius’ Iron resources under my control as of 500 AD, I felt that I would be able to push forward relatively safely. I wasn’t certain if Julius had more than one source of Iron, but prior to when I hooked up the one that I obtained from China, I did not see a second Iron available from Julius in the trading window. The AI past China had some massive stacks of military units, but I was ready for a royal rumble.

I did have a concern that my economy was in a poor state. I had yet to research Code of Laws, but having just completed work on Currency a couple of turns prior to 500 AD, I felt that I had a chance to pop out a couple of more technologies before the maintenance costs of keeping distant cities dragged me down.

I still wasn’t certain at this point whether I was going for a Conquest or Domination Victory, but both were visible on the horizon.

 

[Balbes]

I declared war next in 340BC and finished that civ in 95AD.
I declared war in 160BC and finished that civ in 170AD.
I declared war in 170AD and finished that civ in 455AD.
I declared war in 290AD and finished that civ in 455AD.

Giving me a conquest victory in 470AD

I think this is a pretty strong bid for the Fastest Conquest award. Well done Harok!

I myself contemplated Conquest to compete in the Murky Waters challenge, but in the end I didn't feel like doing "more of the same" after SGOTM5, and went for Space. I'm not really sure if I could beat your 470AD...

 

[Dhoomstriker]

As a point of interest, here are some comparison statistics:

Stats as of 500 AD:

Buildings: 9 Granaries, 5 Barracks, 3 Lighthouse, 1 Library, 1 Forge, National Epic, Great Library, Oracle.

Stats as of 500 AD:
Buildings: 9 Granaries, 9 Barracks, 4 Lighthouses, 4 Colosseums, 3 Christian Temples, 2 Libraries, The Oracle, and 1 Buddhist Temple.

I had also recently captured The Pyramids from Julius.

At this point, I had 13 Cities under my control.

Military Units built: 67
Military Units killed: 32
Military Units lost: 12

Military Units Built: 70
Military Units Killed: 33
Military Units Lost: 12

Note that I did not include Settlers, Workers, or Scouts in those totals. It might be arguable that Scouts should be counted in the Units Killed total, as it's possible for a Scout to defeat your attacking unit.