GOTM 41 Reloaded - Persian Double Challenge

[tR1cKy]

Hi guyz! An update will follow in a few minutes. It will include the maps of the New World as requested a few ago. For now, let me say that this PTW, not conquests, as said in the 1st post The game is standard PTW, but i don't know if the map is custom made (including the start points) or has just come out from a random map generation. It's GOTM 41 as is. Surely the GOTM staff know the answer.

EDIT: uh, the maps of the New World have already been posted
madviking: the histograph will be posted too, not in this update but in the next one (that will follow soon)

 

[tR1cKy]

World domination

730AD - Two more cultural expansion this turn. The actual domination count is: 1158 tiles owned, 105 to go. Troops are ready to lay waste on England:



I sign a RoP with the Iroquois. Then the final attack begins. Warwick, York, London, Nottingham and Canterbury are captured. After the rape fest, the domination count is: 1203 tiles owned, 60 to go. There are wide gaps in the ex-English territory, not that all the cities are back to rank 1. Let's see how those 60 tiles can be owned quickly.

Next turn, Agenicum will be rank 2, claiming 9 tiles good for the domination count. 2 more will come from Augusta. 11 tiles, 49 left. 18 from Oxford and Newcastle, and 31 tiles are left, 2 turns from now. 15 could be claimed by a settler in the gap, and we are left with 16 tiles to own. But in 2 turns Lugdunum will be rank 2, and this will claim 4 more tiles. Istambul will claim 9 tiles and uskudar 4 tiles, leaving Persia with 1 tile over the domination count.

Domination victory in 2 turns then? Not exactly. There's a settler coming north, but it's late damnit! I screwed up a little in this, by not timing correctly the arrive of the settler with the RoP rape. Another one may be trained in York or London, supposing we manage to quell resistance in this turn at least in one of those 2 cities, but even in this case the filler city cannot be built before 760AD.

All the free troops are garrisoned into London and York. At least one of those 2 cities must rush a settler next turn. As a further insurance, a galley is rushed in Augusta, to send more troops to NewCastle should the 1st attack be repealed.

See how the English territory looks like now:



The turn ends, and nothing relevant happens.


740AD - With almost 20 units garrisoned inside, York is no more in civil resistance now. A settler is rushed immediately. Augusta and Agenicum have expanded to rank 2. Domination count: 1214 tiles owned, 49 to go.

Troops have been disembarked outside Oxford. The best defender in the city is a regular spearman. Six immortals should be way enough to capture the city. The galley in Augusta is ready, an immortal and a longbow are embarked and the boat set the sails for Newcastle. The first chunk of 2 units are outside the city. 4 more (boat included) will be in place for the attack next turn. Once again, a regular spearman is the best defender visible. There should be no unpleasant surprises coming from the 2 remaining english cities.

There's nothing else to rush now, so i disband a catapult in Warwick and rush a temple. Rank 2 in 2 turns, exactly the planned turn in which the domination limit will be reached. Just for safety, some extra tiles won't hurt.

Little else is done. The units available now are more than enough to finish the job. No more troops are needed via the shipchain. The turn ends. In the interturn, 2 more cities expand culturally. Resistance is quelled in every captured English city. An upleasant surprise comes from Newcastle: a longbowman came out of the city and killed one on my immortals. No problem, the reinforcements should be enough to capture the city.


750AD - Istanbul and Lugdunum have just expanded, claiming 17 more tiles. Oxford is captured easily, only 2 regular spears were defending it. The surviving immortal outside Newcastle kills a defending spear, then 4 more units arrive, 2 from land and 2 disembarked from the boat. No more than a regular spear and the damaged longbow should be in the city. The fate of England is sealed.

The domination count is now: 1240 tiles owned, 23 to go. The english settler is in place and the last english city has no chances of resisting another turn. I hit enter.


760AD - Gallica and Nuova Gergovia has expanded to rank 2. I'm just 4 tiles short of the domination limit, with the population already way up. Newcastle is captured easily, and the city of Victoria is founded in the english territory, filling a huge gap:



According to MapStat, i'm 21 tiles over the domination limit. Nothing else is done. The turn ends, and the game is over: Domination victory in 770 AD.



Detailed final stats will follow soon, there are a few interesting facts about this game. Just to say one, the end result isn't so brilliant as expected. Stay tuned folks!

 

[madviking]

Did you get the lonely city Oxford (?) in the Spainish territory?

 

[Own]

I am honored to be the first to congratulate you. Great game, but too bad it wasn't the original GOTM .

297 hours! Did you leave your computer running overnight a lot?

 

[madviking]

Now for SPACE RACE TIME!!!
I'm the 2nd to congratulate you!

 

[tR1cKy]

Hi guyz! Thank you all for the support!

Short replies:

madviking: yes, i took them over both, although they were redundant at the end. The 2 cities provided 18 tiles and i ended the turn 24 tiles over the limit. But they provided a tiny increase in score anyway.

Own: it won't be immediate. I'd like to try GOTM 43, then go for the 2nd part of this quest. Real life takes its toll, and i don't have too much time to spend here.

--------

Some condiderations about this game

Let me say first that the final result wasn't so exceptional, in regard to what i was doing in the earlier part of this game. I was hoping that with this replay i would have been able to enter in the top ten. Well, i was mistaken. The final score is 6965 points and the resulting Jason is 10720, putting this game at place 21 of the scoreboard, if it was submitted. My original game resulted to be ranked 36th, and my end score is just 7% over the original one. Not an astounding progress, then

The score progress is almost flawless:



And the cultural histograph is quite good: i ended up being the cultural leader of the world, in a game totally war-oriented:



What went wrong then? Without bragging, i can say that my ancient age progress was quite brilliant. The culprit then is the strategy i followed in the middle ages. In the original game, i raped the Ottomans, then went for the Celts, then assimilated the English. This time i attacked the Celt first, with an honorable war, then signed RoP with Ottomans and England, then raped both. Well, this strategy didn't pay off as expected. First, it was too ambitious, at least for me. The capture of the Celtic nation went slow, due also to the fact that a big chunk of Celtic land was still unroaded jungle. I had to spend turns to walk over the jungle and worker action to at least road it somewhere. If i would have gone for the Ottomans first, probably the celtic workers could have had the time to road a few jungle tiles... who knows? Then, once the capture was over, i didn't have enough troops to attack both the Ottomans and the English at the same time (i was hoping for it), and so i went for the Ottomans first (good move) and the English 2nd. But having all the troops on the southern part of the New World delayed the capture of England at least for 4/5 turns.

At the end, the strategy of attacking Ottomans first then proceed north smoothly would have been the best, unless i had enough troops to withstand an attack on 2 different fronts. In this case domination could have been earned by 600-650 AD, with a fairly better score. Uh, a humbling lesson for me at the end.

A map progression will be posted soon. Then this log will sleep for a week or 2. Once GOTM 43 is over, i'll start the Space Race part. A turn in the late ancient age will be reloaded and i'll start from there. I'm going to research literature (to crank out libraries) then go for the usual assimilation of the Old World. At this point, the whole thing should turn into a peaceful game in which technological progress would be paramount. And, being scientific, i have the necessary potential to keep it up.

However, it's bloody ages that i don't play a peaceful game. The turn progress will be slow and suggestions would be very appreciated.

That's all for the moment. Seeya soon guyz!

 

[madviking]

what would happen if you did this in conquests?

 

[tR1cKy]

uh?!? what do you mean exactly?

EDIT: Own i usually leave the PC always up, to download stuff with WinMX and such. In a few occasions, i left the game open as well overnight, and so it shows a disproportionate number of hours played

 

[CoolioVonHoolio]

good job tricky, not the "legendary game" that the ugly start game was, but it was entertaining. i look forward to more storys by you.

 

[madviking]

tr1cky- i mean, what would like if you had Civ3 Conquests. in other words, how would you overcome the volcanos, curraghs, ancient calvary etc.

 

[The Fjonis]

297 hours??? Man, that's insane. If you started on April 15th, the date of the first post, you have averaged well over 6,5 hours pr day. W00t??? You should get out more!

 

[tR1cKy]

Hi dudez! Some replies:

Coolio: thanx man! Yes, it's not like the "Bad Start" game, nor it could be in any way. The Bad Start was an almost hopeless struggle from a desperate start position. This was an "easy" map, in which the only challenge would have been to win fast and/or maximize score. BTW, you'll see more from me... after the GOTM 43, i'll play the "Space Race" part, then probably i'll try a domination with only expansion game. It's an intriguing challenge.

madviking: uh... ok i understand now. Well, i'm sorry but you're asking the wrong man. I don't have Conquests, nor i plan to buy or "obtain" it... about volcanoes i would have simply avoided to settle around, don't like to have a productive city torched suddenly by something that, sooner or later, will happen for sure. Curraghs? They're like the canoe in DYP, right? A cheap, slow and defenseless boat that can be built from the start. Quite useless in this game, in which you could only travel safely to the other continent with the GL built. Ancient cavalry? Uh, no horses into the home continent, so it would have been quite useless as well.

Fjonis: hehe you're right man but i haven't stayed in console playing for so long. In several occasion, i left the game running overnight, and even during the day while at work. It's a side effect of having the PC always up and connected to download stuff from the net. BTW, i definitely neet to go out more... now that i have ditched my ex-GF

 

[madviking]

ACs don't need horses, they come the ToZ wonder. (ivory required)

curraghs are 1.1.2 (3 for seafaring) no transportation

 

[Zelda's Man]

... then probably i'll try a domination with only expansion game. It's an intriguing challenge.

How can you possibly reach a domination limit by expansion alone? You need war, don't you? Or am I misinterpreting your statement?

 

[CoolioVonHoolio]

Coolio: thanx man! Yes, it's not like the "Bad Start" game, nor it could be in any way. The Bad Start was an almost hopeless struggle from a desperate start position. This was an "easy" map, in which the only challenge would have been to win fast and/or maximize score. BTW, you'll see more from me... after the GOTM 43, i'll play the "Space Race" part, then probably i'll try a domination with only expansion game. It's an intriguing challenge.

*in napoleon dynamite voice*............"yessss"

 

[Own]

Ex - Girlfriend and 6.5 hours of civ per day, coincedence, I think not.

 

[tR1cKy]

Hi U all! After a short vacation, here we are again!

Own hehe... it's true that the time i devote to Civ3 is quite incompatible with girls - you cannot play with a gorgeous chick hanging around you, right? Gals could be a real pain, some of them simply cannot understand the fact that sometimes we need to be alone with ourselves doing what we like, or have some times with good old friends... i hope for a better pick with the next one

Zelda's that's precisely the difficult with this variant. You cannot declare war (unless forced by MPP), you cannot use failed espionage attempt to trigger war, but you can ask people to remove their troops and, if they declare, so be it. In war time, you cannot conquer nor raze enemy cities, you cannot even invade enemy territory, although you can attack enemies currently placed in neutral or ally territory.

So how to reach domination limit? Self expansion, cultural flips, extorsions during peace treaties, propaganda missions, and resettling empty spaces. Nothing else. Culture would be paramount, and the difficulty level cannot be too high. I'm thinking about these settings, for a 1st attempt:

- Babylon (rel/sci, so temples and libraries at half price)
- Regent level
- Standard pangea map.
- Wet, warm, 5 billions years old territory.

 

[tR1cKy]

Something i forgot to post: the map progression of the game. Enjoy.

Part 1:


Part 2:


Final:

 

[CoolioVonHoolio]

wow tricky, i love how you keep these logs! so detailed! this kinda makes me wanna go back and try gotm 41 again.

 

[Own]

Since you've already won domination, are you just gonna build your spaceship, even though you won't get a "win?"