Gotm 35

[Duke of Marlbrough]

We have about 13 submissions, slightly down from normal.

Was the large map a reason?
The holiday season?
The difficulty of the map set up?


Map tweaks posted in Spoiler thread.

 

[DasMan]

I'm afraid my excuse was really the holiday season. I started (badly) and only made very slow progress due to the large map. I liked the difficult start-up though - definitely challenging.

Keep up the good work DoM. I'll try to find time for GOTM36.

 

[ElephantU]

Year-End lack of time to play...

 

[TimTheEnchanter]

I did what I usually do. Start play, get up to somewhere between 1 and 1000AD and realize the month is over and it's time to start the next one.

 

[golem]

Í have played OCC, just bëcause of large map - I would have no chance to play it normally.

 

[dogma]

Originally posted by Duke of Marlbrough
We have about 13 submissions, slightly down from normal.

I simply ran out of time. The last 10 or so turns have already been an hour each, and I still need at least 7 turns (but probably 10 or more with my luck of available technologies to research) until I can launch my spaceship. And if I want a decent score that means another 15 turns to settle/conquer earth and grow cities from 8 to 20 (or from 0 to 12).

Of course I shouldn't have allowed the Spanish to build Copernicus' Observatory, and losing two cities in the BCs didn't help either. Thus, I'm now researching radio in 1550 and will probably end at about the same number of turns where restarts do not occur anymore.

One of the time-consuming things was to keep a log of how many beakers the next advance will take, and yes, it does pay off to gift to the Indians. The other side of the medal is that they went on with all that knowledge and discovered mobile warfare, usually I prefer my maps empty of armors. I keep my fingers crossed that they do not go further and discover nuclear fission.

Duke, would you be interested in the saves a1, a1000 and a1550 of my not yet finished game, just for the record ?

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

Sure. I think that would be cool if people submitted their incomplete games for others to see.

 

[Old n Slow]

I knew going into the month that the playing time would be tight (especially with an out of town trip in the mix) -- thus my decision to go with the OCC. Had it been more obvious that I had no chance, I would have bailed & made a stab at "acquiring" more cities & go for a "win". Instead, it came down close to the wire -- & even after the Babs launched, I felt that there was an outside chance (there were others at war at the time) that Babylon might fall. Oh well.

I reckon that next year at this time we might go for a "tiny" map or maybe a warlord level 'ideal' start with everyone playing OCC -- either of which offers fewer turns (and deity level may also do the same) to motivate participation.

 

[SideshowBob]

Originally posted by Old n Slow
maybe a warlord level 'ideal' start with everyone playing OCC -- either of which offers fewer turns (and deity level may also do the same) to motivate participation.

Everyone playing OCC sounds like a good idea. Having different maps, settings, objects and stuff is one of the things I appreciate with the GOTM. And the GOTM forum is a great place to develop your tactics. When playing only by yourself yu can cheat as much as you want, but when competeing with others and with the GOTM-rules you need to think about what went wrong and why or what worked well and why. An OCC would be a great opportunity for the lesser developed players (hm, am I thinking of me here? ) to really be forced to train trading and realizing the advantages of trade.

 

[A+ombomb]

A 100% occ game would be great. I look forward to that. Another idea might be to allow players to submit both a normal game and an occ game (second game played) since occ has no chance of competing with a normal game score wise. Yet another idea would be to give the occ game a multiplier, say x8, to encourage occ play.

I didn't submit simply because I ran out of time. Maybe next time.

 

[Achinz]

Any chance of seeing the results soon, now that gotm37 is out?

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

I've actually had them done for a couple weeks, but had not had the time to 'finalize' them for the site. I'll post a screenshot of them tonight.

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

 

[Jayne]

Yay!! [dance] I'm in the top 10! Surely something is wrong!

 

[Old n Slow]

OOOOOOoooohhh! My first bottom!

Hmmm, now I think I'll have to try for the variety pack of awards...

 

[A+ombomb]

I find it hard to believe zenon didn't reload huts for advanced tribes, lol. GOTM score of 573 is pretty insane, considering bonus score for early finish isn't included (correct?), or is it included if you do it with a spaceship? I am curious, though, perhaps we can check out what he was doing, or are games not allowed to be posted on the site?

 

[ElephantU]

The GOTM score heavily weights earlier finish, whether by conquest or spaceship. It is usually not wise to delay a finish to try to "pump up" your score with Wonders or extra city growth - but do turn engineers into cities and pump up your Luxuries on the turn before you will win.

Shortly after the standings are posted, a ZIP file of all the submitted games has been available on the GOTM page. If you submit a log with your game it is often included. Check it out here:

http://www.civfanatics.com/civ2gotmarchive.shtml

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

As soon as I make the site page the saved games will be available. Since I have no experience in Early Landing games myself I got someone with somewhat more experience in the matter to take a look at the game.

They were fine with the game, so I am as well.

Of course, once the saved games are up, everyone is welcome to take a look. Perhaps Zenon can help others learn to play as well as he does. Zenon is known over at Poly for his superb Early Landing games.

 

[A+ombomb]

You speak of making engineers into cities before ending the game, but wouldn't that put other cities with a large food deficit (illegal), assuming you have the map covered?

The reason why I ask if the early game finish that is built into the game was included is because even a score of 1120 is quite high (score - spaceship bonus) for that year. In order to achieve that score while still having all the techs, you would need to have alot of hut help. It is simply not possible to have enough trade to produce the tech necessary for a spaceship while still having enough money to "power grow" to a score of 1140 at that date. Even without the spaceship, you are looking at a GOTM score at nearly 500, which is a very strong game IMO even if your tech is only in the stone age. I guess I will reserve further judgment until I actually see the save points.

 

[ElephantU]

Over at Apolyton.Net both Zenon and Solo achieved a spaceship landing before 400AD, without using huts or starting techs. Extensive logs and game strategies were discussed. Take a look for yourself:
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=104782

As to huts, there are some relevant statistics for comparison here:
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=69873

Regarding Engineers into cities, a couple turns of preplanning should yield sites that have one free tile to work: most of the existing cities should not be near size 20 anyway. Leaving an Engineer (except in OCC) denies you an extra "citizen point" toward your final score. Same thing for upping the Luxuries.