GOTM 30 Spoiler II - End of Middle Age, Full Map, all contacts

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by Mauer
Well this is my first GOTM, and my first post in the spoiler. I wish I had kept better track of what went on. I can sum it up like this didn't have much money, way behind in tech, and couldn't win a war against the girl scouts. Then again this was my first game above regent. I suppose if I had kept better notes some of you could help my techniques. But I have learned alot from reading all of your posts.

Welcome to the GOTM Mauer!

The folks here definitely could help you, but atm they all seem preoccupied w/ the SGOTM. It is the NKOTB. If you have your old saves still, load them and post some pics or narrate what was going on at that moment.

 

[scoutsout]

Well...there I was, up Scientific Method and mulling over a Space Race or Diplomatic option... when the usual business with MPPs broke everything loose, and this... "happened":

 

[dojoboy]

At least its not a pile on against you. What is the strategic situation atm?

 

[grs]

@scoutsout: I would really like to have gotten that! In industrial times I ended up in a not so nice everyone vs. everyone else war
More to come if the spoiler is available.

--
grs

 

[scoutsout]

@ dojoboy: The strategic situation is a little hard to judge. My war with England was timed a little funny, so I didn't do the land grabs that many others have done in Keltoi and Viking lands. With the exception of 3 American cities that I took (outlying island ones) the Keltoi have taken one American Coastal city. Other than that, no borders have moved. Nobody has Replaceable Parts yet... so I'm building mostly Cav and Cannon atm. I'm hoping I'll have rubber so I can go with an Infantry/Arty/Cav stack to make a run at Washington (which has Smith's Trading Co., among other things...)

@grs: I look forward to seeing what your "world against the world" war looked like...

 

[scoutsout]

I'm calling this little series of screencaps "Scout's Ouch":

 

[CKS]

Well, my middle ages rolled along surprisingly well for me, except for one huge mistake. Xerxes attacked me, after one of my little colony cities on one of the continents in the middle of the map. It was a worthless little city to me, but I later realized that when its cultural borders expanded it was going to take away Xerxes's only source of iron. (If he'd only have built a library we could have avoided the whole mess.) Anyway, I panicked, and got some other civs to ally against him, but then didn't pay close enough attention and made peace with him before the alliances had all expired. Consequently, nearly everyone is furious with me, for the entire rest of the game.

This turns out not to matter. Between the great library, lots of science wonders, and a slow AI tech pace, I am the tech leader and so I can get anything I want by selling techs. Lincoln does attack once, another worthless little city that I'd planted just because there was still empty space on that continent, but then he doesn't pursue matters. He lands a few units on a continent I care about, they die and gain him nothing, and then he gives up.

There were a lot of culture flips in my game during the middle ages. I gained two English cities, and then they flipped back. I got two Tokugawan cities, and they flipped back. I got and kept a Viking city and one from the Han, and maybe one more Tokugawan city stayed mine.

I built several wonders, going after whatever I could get. I got caught in several cascades, but managed to avoid any 600 shield marketplaces. Interestingly, although I had no real thoughts about which wonders to build, these were what I built:

Great Library
Copernicus's Observatory
Leonardo's Workshop
Newton's University
Theory of Evolution
Seti Program

Essentially they are all science ones except Leo's, and he was a scientist. I got SETI after losing the UN race exactly the same way scoutsout did, Persia building it the turn before I would have finished. (Luckily Xerxes wanted it for the same reason I did, so as not to hold any elections.) I didn't plan on building the Hoover Dam, as I didn't think I had any river cities. I was surprised when an advisor suggested building it, as I still didn't see any rivers, but I agreed and worked on it for a while, until someone else built it.

I entered the industrial age in 1270 with the top score, reasonable power, and plenty of culture. I was beginning to have hopes of winning, but I was worried about my broken alliances causing me problems. Getting to fission so I could build the UN was going to be a priority. I also suspected that the "what happens when the money runs out?" warning meant that industrial and modern age resources would be scarce, and this worried me.

 

[denyd]

Decisions, decisions

It's about 1700 AD, in 2 turns I'll complete the UN, I'm at war with England & America with all the others as allies against both. I was planning on a Spaceship victory, but I'm debating about the difference in score. Is it worth waiting 50-60 turns to discover the needed techs to launch (I won't get much help from the AI) or just go ahead and call for a vote I'm sure to win?

In the old days, I'd have waited and added happy faces to my empire to milk until the launch date, but with Jason determining the quality of victory, the rules of the game have changed. Any suggestions are welcome.

 

[samildanach]

If you are in a position to use map stat ie. full map knowledge then you can guestimate how much you have to increase your firaxis score per turn to increase your jason score. I didn't even attempt to milk after last months debacle so i don't know what you should be aiming for. For a small map I would aiming for 25> as rule of thumb but since its an archipelago you may want to aim higher than that.
If it doesn't look like you will be able to meet the target score increase whatever it turns out to be then its better to call the U.N vote rather than bleed jason points IMO.

 

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by denyd
Decisions, decisions

It's about 1700 AD, in 2 turns I'll complete the UN, I'm at war with England & America with all the others as allies against both. I was planning on a Spaceship victory, but I'm debating about the difference in score. Is it worth waiting 50-60 turns to discover the needed techs to launch (I won't get much help from the AI) or just go ahead and call for a vote I'm sure to win?

In the old days, I'd have waited and added happy faces to my empire to milk until the launch date, but with Jason determining the quality of victory, the rules of the game have changed. Any suggestions are welcome.

Well, what else do you have going on? I know the feeling: UN or Space Race decision. Just play on and see how you feel, things might look different in the morning.

 

[Leibniz]

Originally posted by denyd
Decisions, decisions

It's about 1700 AD, in 2 turns I'll complete the UN, I'm at war with England & America with all the others as allies against both. I was planning on a Spaceship victory, but I'm debating about the difference in score. Is it worth waiting 50-60 turns to discover the needed techs to launch (I won't get much help from the AI) or just go ahead and call for a vote I'm sure to win?

In the old days, I'd have waited and added happy faces to my empire to milk until the launch date, but with Jason determining the quality of victory, the rules of the game have changed. Any suggestions are welcome.

I was in the same situation. I started a prebuild for the UN but not with the intention to go for a diplomatic victory. On the other hand i had finished off the English that were furious and there were fourious Tokugawa, cautious Keltoi, annoyed Persian, polite Americans and polite Han left. It was obvious, that me and the Han would be the Un candidates.

We had 5 turns left on the completion of UN, as Persia declared war on the Han. One turn later America and the Keltoi signed a MA against the Han. I couldnt withstand to gift Radio to everyone...

 

[smackster]

open PTW 1.27f

AA post

We left the AA with England down to a few cities in 260AD, very soon they were down to one city far off and we gave them peace.

Still no leader and we still had a number of galleys from the English adventure so we made a rush on the Celts.

We landed with about 12 swords and 3 horses, which seemed enough to take a city or two. The celts had got Medieval Infantry but I didn't think they would have too many, oh how I was wrong. My whole invasion force lasted two turns, before it was completely wiped out. Luckily the second attack was on an elite sword and that resulted in a defensive leader, that I managed to get out before all the troops died.

Having won GOTM with Domination wins for about 5-6 in a row I decided at this time not to win by Domination in this one, and actually to try for Space Race. I had my leader for the FP, that I put into London. This seemed like a real challenge as the AI did seem tech challenged on this map, so I don't know how much help I would get.

I soon got my second core up and running, luckily helped by the fact that all the cities round London were 3 spaces which was the same as those around the capital.

So within a couple of techs into the MA I was researching at 4 turns. I did get Chivalry, Mon, and Theology from the AI, and I researched down the MT path. At Metalurgy I found that I could only research at 5 turns, so decided to kick of a GA as soon as I got Astronomy.

Tokugawa was the best trading partner and were soon giving me good GPT for techs. I realised that maybe I should not have taken so much cash from them as from this time the AI did not research a single mandatory tech for me until the end of the game (space race). But I needed the cash to keep researching at 100% and 4 turn techs.

I pushed the celts back on their Island with my culture and settled on their island pushing them back further. As I was only researching mandatory techs, it was a long time before I got MT. This was about 1000AD and as soon as that occurred I launched an attack onto the Celts with a Conquistador ready to start the GA.

One thing that was obvious on this map was that there were very few resources, but I found that with the tech lead it was easy to keep luxuries coming from the other AI.

I moved into the IA in about 1050 AD, with the attack well underway on the Celts. Obviously I was a Democracy as I didn't intend to fight for long.

 

[gozpel]

I continued scouting with my galleys to get a grip of the world. We actually have a real islands map and I simply love it. It's my fav game setting in my own games since it can drag on forever

And it will.

I declared on the Vikings 70bc and the war ended around 190AD when I got their continent. The extra luxes didn't help much as my people demanded more.

Well then, England was next and between 290AD - 380AD I had some fun. But no leader and I desperately wanted to move my palace after I built FP on my home continent.

So as a funny AI tactic, the Celts tried to sneak attack. I had ROP and was trading furs from them and yet they had to abuse this comfortable deal?

The Celt-war lasted between 400AD to 620AD because I wen't slowly to gather the strength to counter their Gallic Swordsmen.
I built a city on the top of their continent near their only iron and let their GS get killed against my 30 plus troops and some catapults. When the attack slowed down I razed the iron city and built another town S of it and moved my troops over there.

I got a leader from taking Entremont, which I promptly sent to the Viking island to build a new palace.

After these wars my former opponents sat in some island towns spread around.

I researched the bottom line myself and got the others by nice trades, especially from Persia.

Declaring on Tokugawa and take their northern island and a city on their mainland sent me into the IA. Way ahead of anyone else.

EDIT - Forgot to say that I entered GA 1100AD and made it to IA 1190AD I think. Btw, another leader gave me Leo's

(stuffed up the pics, sorry)

 

[Offa]

Originally posted by gozpel
It's my fav game setting in my own games since it can drag on forever

And that is good?

 

[Megalou]

1.27 Predator

Good work, Kuningaz and Drazek. I have not finished yet but you will both get a better 100K date than me. I think my mistakes are easy to spot:

* Missed the cow in the early stages.
* Built perhaps too much culture early on and so neglected military and workers. I sort of ran out of land.
* Where are the leaders? I set up leader farming situations against both England and Keltoi, but the leaders just won't show up. Gradually I realized I had to hand build an FP.

It really is a great map. I just wish the AI would use all those ships in a better way. After a couple of centuries with an ROP with the Vikings I didn't even think about the berserks any more. It's as if ainwood wanted a situation with the Vikings, given that long coastal stretch between us and them, but the game wouldn't cooperate with the idea. Or maybe I was just too peaceful.

I'd like a deity game next time.

 

[gozpel]

Originally posted by Offa
And that is good?

Who wants domination and conquest by 800AD every time?
Not me anyways.

 

[icko]

Since I didn't see anyone pointing it out....

The last city name on the list for us Spanish jokers was: "Lugar Tonto Ciudad"
(I don't know spanish, but Babelfish translate it as "idiot place city")


Other amusing touches (for me) were the one-tile-resource island in the 'micronesia' centre-low region of the map (there is incense, spices and perhaps others).
Around there, there is also a 2-tiles 2-mountains uninhabitable island with iron, although that might be because of jumping iron...

Plus the now usual feature of barbarian islands that Ainwood likes so much.

Any other eggs around?

Cheers for the fun!

 

[akots]

Not much to tell about the game. After a long predator series, I decided to play open class (PTW 1.27f). AI can have as many bonuses as possible but depriving me of my own worker is too cruel IMO.... The game was apparently very similar to Drazek's but I went rather heavy on culture and was leading all along. England was conquered with swords, Viking fell to MDI, Tokugawa surrendered to knights, Lincoln was also battled mostly with knights, and Han tried to withstand cavalry punch but failed. Celts and Xerxes were left alone. There were two amazing features of the map: exhilarating logistics of troop movement between various islands and large number of coastal tiles far away from the actual coastline. This made early domination impossible. So, all game Spain built some culture to gain these remote coastal tiles, military, settlers and temples. I revolted to Republic rather early and stayed there to the end. There was a plenty of cash for rushing temples and settlers, ships and troops still allowing to do some research. Domination was triggered in 1200AD with Firaxis score 6130. It was a very unusual map and playing experience. Thanks to ainwood and the GOTM team!