Gotm 43 Spoiler

TimTheEnchanter said:
Bribe - refers to inciting a revolt in a city with a diplomat or spy. (not sure if Lafayette also frowns on bribing units as well)
I don't frown, but I don't bribe units either :)
I discovered long ago the shining power of vet spies , studied them thoroughly together with SlowThinker and decided that bribing was no fun.
Anyone willing to bribe cities or units is perfectly free to do so but, for me, it makes the game so easy that some of the fun disappears. That's why I don't bribe anymore.
 
Black clicking will "usually" tell you only where land is, not what kind of terrain that land has. I say "usually" because it can be fooled. The Ocean gets #1, but the first "continent" gets #1 too, and if that is a large continent it can hide most of the map from black-clicking. Some large inland lakes can get continent numbers too, so you need to take what you may learn from black-clicking with several grains of salt.

The main advantage I see to black-clicking is helping out in the start of a game looking for a good place to settle the capital city. With some knowledge of special terrain and hut patterns you can figure out which direction to go to get an unsupported "mercenary" unit from a hut (about 60% of the time) and where to find a few special terrain tiles to found your capital (or One City) near. There are also some useful situations when you are trying to jump between islands with a Trireme and need to know if there is any land nearby. Interpreting black-clicking info is an art, not a science, but it can give a little help to your early game. Years ago, players didn't know there was patterns to huts and special terrains, or what the correct formulas for trade payoffs were, or how to create a "phantom" road. All of that is knowledge that has been discovered - why not make use of it?
 
Related to but separate from black clicking, there is map analysis. I have learned it from ElephantU and now it is one of my favorite tools. You can do map analysis with or without black clicking. Obviously, with black clicking you can do more earlier. Like ElephantU said above, map analysis and black clicking are very useful at the begining for finding the right spot to place your capital. Map analysis is also useful for knowing which special tiles are covered by grassland (Black clicking is irrelevant here).

What I mean by map analysis, is creating a blank map in map editor that fits the size of your game; then determining the seed used for resource placement that matches what you can see.

For example, using map analysis in this GOTM, you could determine (though only after leaving your original island) that the starting spot is a whale-special covered by grassland. Changing the grassland to forest results in Silk giving you an extra shield and 3 extra arrows at the price of 1-2 foods (depending on government) which is well worth it.
 
I have played till late 1600s and have just started the space race. I have stayed peaceful throughout and only engaged in defense. I will post a detailed log later, but here are a few snap shots:

Status at +0001
Population: 0.59M; Cities: 10; Trade routes: 0D0F; Government: Republic
Finance. Treasury: 22; Cost per turn: 0; Income: 34; Tax rate: 40%
Science: Total advances: 20; Advance every 8 turns; Science rate: 40%
Production: 43MT; 0 polluted tiles
Wonders: Colossus, Marco Polo.
Units: 3 settler, 1 warrior, 1 Trireme
Romans: 5 cities, 10 tech, 213g; No contacts with anyone; Pyramids;
Egyptian: 4 cities, 15 tech, 194g; No contacts with anyone;
English: 5 cities, 9 tech, 405g; No contacts with anyone;
Sioux: 3 cities, 10 tech, 288g; No contacts with anyone;

Status at +1000
Population: 5.56M; Cities: 12; Trade routes: 4D2F; Government: Democracy
Finance. Treasury: 27; Cost per turn: 48; Income: 223; Tax rate: 50%
Science: Total advances: 33; Advance every 11 turns; Science rate: 20%
Production: 90MT; 0 polluted tiles
Wonders: Colossus, Marco Polo, Hanging gardens, King Richard.
Units: 7 settler (2 None), 1 warrior, 1 Trireme, 1 Frigate, 6 diplomat, 10 caravan
Romans: 7 cities, 16 tech, 272g; ; Pyramids;
Egyptian: 8 cities, 23 tech, 139g; ; Great Wall;
English: 7 cities, 18 tech, 547g; War with me; Lighthouse, Great Library;
Sioux: 6 cities, 21 tech, 484g; ; ;

Status at +1500
Population: 29.18M; Cities: 17; Trade routes: 6D13F; Government: Democracy
Finance. Treasury: 746; Cost per turn: 211; Income: 436; Tax rate: 20%
Science: Total advances: 63; Advance every 2 turns; Science rate: 60%
Production: 203MT; 1 polluted tiles
Wonders: Colossus, Marco Polo, Hanging gardens, King Richard, Michelangelo, Oracle, Copernicus, Magellan, Newton
Units: 5 settler (2 None), 4 Engineer, 1 legion, 1 Marine, 1 Trireme, 2 Frigate, 1 Ironclad, 6 diplomat, 4 caravan, 2 Freight, 1 explorer.
Romans: 7 cities, 26 tech, 397g; ; Pyramids;
Egyptian: 11 cities, 35 tech, 302g; ; Great Wall;
English: 8 cities, 31 tech, 982g; ; Lighthouse, Great Library, Shakespeare, Leo
Sioux: 6 cities, 42 tech, 1001g; ; Darwin;
 
How's this for comparison, Ali?

AD1-
One City, 0.15M (size 5), 2TRs (+3ea), Celebrating Monarchy (Lux 30%)
Finance: Treasury 143g, Cost 2g, Income 14g @60%
(Temple and Harbor)
Science: Advances 18 (6 white), Research 91 turns @ 10%
(NOTE: research is down in favor of RBing gold for caravan building)
Production: 1MT (1 shield, rest of workers on Ocean for trade)
Wonders: MarcoPolo (4 alliances, about 50g every 2-4 turns each)
Units: 1 Legion, 2 Horse, 1 Elephant, 1 Trireme, 1 Diplomat (only 1 Horse and 1 Trireme supported)
Romans: 7 cities, 12 techs (2 white), building GL
Egypt: 5 cities, 16 techs, building GL
English: 7 cities, 13 techs (4 white), Pyramids, building GL
Sioux: 4 cities, 12 techs (3 white), building GL

AD1000-
One City, 2.3M (size 21), 3TRs (+12ea), Celebrating Republic (Lux 20%)
Finance: Treasury 925g, Cost 14g, Income 30g (10%)
(Temple, Harbor, Market, Bank, Library, University, Aquaduct, Sewers)
Science: Advances 32 (9 white), Research 3 turns @70%
Production: 24MT
Wonders: MarcoPolo, Colossus, KingRich, Copernicus, Shakes
Units: 1xNomad, 2xLegion, 3xHorse, 1xChariot, 1xElephant, 2xTriremes, 2xDiplomats, 1xExplorer, 1xWine caravan (repeating)
(NOTE: all units but Triremes are unsupported)
Romans: 9 cities, 26 techs, GreatLibrary
Egypt: 6 cities, 30 techs, HangGardens, building Leos
English: 10 cities, 30 techs, Pyramids, building Leos
Sioux: 4 cities, 30 techs, Lighthouse

You only built 2 wonders between AD1 and AD1000, and neither was Mikes. Doing Multi City, Mikes should have been before KingRich (although it does greatly benefit for our starting location). Hanging Gardens is a decent substitute, but not enough.

Just about all of my focus between AD1 and AD1000 was wonder building, financed by alliance gifts. Whenever an AI treasury got above 50g I asked and received a 50g gift. Most of the time they were earning 20-30g per turn, so I could ask every 2nd or 3rd turn. I kept them happy with tech gifts, holding out Astronomy, Engineering and Medicine as long as I could. Many caravans were PartialRushBuys of 116-119g every second turn. Note the city improvements I put in as well - I had a Colosseum too in the early ADs, but sold it off after getting Shakes.
 
la fayette said:
I don't frown, but I don't bribe units either :)
I discovered long ago the shining power of vet spies , studied them thoroughly together with SlowThinker and decided that bribing was no fun.
Anyone willing to bribe cities or units is perfectly free to do so but, for me, it makes the game so easy that some of the fun disappears. That's why I don't bribe anymore.

Is it cheaper to bribe small cities that are rioting, have few improvements and are far from their capital?

Good thing about bribing is that you get a few units and any units not in the city die. I don't think the amount of units in the city determines the price in any way. It must be best therefore to bribe cities that support lots of offensive units.

Do bribed units get supported or are they 'NONE?'
 
Yes, small size, disorder and distance from capital lowers the cost. Also a lower treasury and the type of unit (Dip/Spy/VetSpy) will lower cost too. Note that "distance from capital" is measured from the tile where the Dip/Spy initiates the bribe, not the location of the city, so try to start on the far side relative to the capital.

Units that come with bribed cities are supported by the new city. If you bribe a unit alone the game assigns support based on the nearest city. If it is yours, it is supported; if it is anyone elses (even Barb), it is NONE. If same distance, supported.
 
DSN said:
Good thing about bribing is that you get a few units and any units not in the city die.

'

IIRC bribing gives you the units around the city and destroys the units more than 2 tiles away from the city.

(don't ask me too much about bribing: I have almost forgotten :lol: :lol: :lol: )
 
As a "spoiler" about GOTM'ing...I discovered the ability to load the starting game xx_b4000.sav into the CivII map editor and it shows the entire world with specials and huts, but no cities. I don't consider this cheating but another way to out smart the AI and find the best goodies and terrain spots for my cities.
I did some black clicking but that wasn't very helpful and was very time consuming. Then I created a blank map the same size as the GOTM map and from the starting point of my city I created the landscape, and specials/goodie distribution as I found what the patterns were. That was a bit tedious, too.
What do you all think about this map editor loading and revealing the world? Is it cheating or not?
 
It boggles my mind that viewing the map was never explicitly listed as cheating. I think it must fall into the area of "always presumed...". DoM, can we add that to the primary Rules page?
 
ElephantU said:
How's this for comparison, Ali?
Impressive. With only one city at +1 and +1000 you were only 1-2 techs behind my dozen or so cities.

ElephantU said:
You only built 2 wonders between AD1 and AD1000, and neither was Mikes. Doing Multi City, Mikes should have been before KingRich (although it does greatly benefit for our starting location). Hanging Gardens is a decent substitute, but not enough.
Good points. I gave King Richards priority for 3 reasons. One, the obvious, is that few cities were producing much of any shields. Two, back when I built it Sioux had developed Engineering and exchanged it to me for another tech, but no one yet had Monotheism; I also had 6 caravans on hand. Three, when I built King Richards, because of Hanging Gardens I was already in celebration. King Richards was built in +360. Michelangelo in +1040.

I have now played till 1750 and just launched a full space ship.
 
Tanstaafl said:
As a "spoiler" about GOTM'ing...I discovered the ability to load the starting game xx_b4000.sav into the CivII map editor and it shows the entire world with specials and huts, but no cities. I don't consider this cheating but another way to out smart the AI and find the best goodies and terrain spots for my cities.

I did some black clicking but that wasn't very helpful and was very time consuming. Then I created a blank map the same size as the GOTM map and from the starting point of my city I created the landscape, and specials/goodie distribution as I found what the patterns were. That was a bit tedious, too.
What do you all think about this map editor loading and revealing the world? Is it cheating or not?
I have known about this for some time now but I did consider it cheating so I refrained from it. But your statement makes me wonder. Combining black clicking and Map analysis you can construct the entire map (with some caveats covered earlier by ElephantU). You would know the location of all huts and all specials. The only thing you would not know is the type of terrain at any given location.

Why should we allow this much more tedious approach and not allow viewing the map outright in the map editor?

Personally, my biggest disappointment with all civ versions is that seeing the entire world is not a game option. Playing on known maps without this option is ridiculous, yet a world map was supplied since the first version of Civ.

I often play on maps that I have designed myself and freely look at the map in the map editor.
 
Seeing the entire world, or knowing the basic land masses and oceans, is not unusual at the start of a CivII game. The few scenarios I have played all show the entire world, with the cities existing at the start of the game.
To win the game, playing by basic "non-cheating" rules, a player still must pay attention to details, his/her plan and create strategies in city production, wonder development and diplomatic/war relations. Having a basic knowledge of the world shouldn't be that much of an advantage. What does the AI know about the whole world...well, the AI knows all the other civ's parts, some where from 3-7 parts of the world.
 
I've responded to this discussion in the separate thread but I would like to make one other point about "revealing the map"...

Isn't using the black click method revealing the map? The game itself has things that allow players to learn information about the terrain. I guess using the posted "patterns" for huts and specials is not "revealing the map" but it does do that to a degree. There is also the point to be made that the whole part of the map is NOT revealed, the cities and units of other civ's. Only the terrain and specials are shown, just as some could construct by black clicking or building the map in the editor as you move your own units around.

I guess the issue might boil down to something being too easy versus something that is much more cumbersome and time consuming as to their legality in this gaming situation.
 
I finished early this morning. Micromanagement at the end took a lot of real time with each turn approaching an hour. Space ship landed in 1761. I managed to stay peaceful all throughout the game and never took over any AI city. The peace was very fragile near the end with English and Sioux landing Armor near my major cities. But I opted to buy them off rather than destroy them to keep my peace score (+66 at the end).

Silk trade was the name of the game. Most of my cities produced Silk and Egyptians had an insatiable appetite for them. Egyptians being civilized tend to develop larger cities compared to other AI which are great trading partners.
 
Interesting. My One City launched in 1758; I am currently buying up obsolete/forgotten wonders (of course, the first HAD to be Eiffel Tower!) and yawning through the 15 turns of flight. All four AI civs continue allied and Enthusiastic - the Romans are even Worshipful, despite not getting a gift in about 1,000 years. My 3 early trade routes with the Sioux did not lead to mid-game supply changes (one reason may be the lack of land tiles in the city radius to transform), but in the late game Gold became the wildcard. I was in the rush to stockpile freights before Apollo, though, so I only got 2 deliveries in - and I am not sure that using the WonderBread trick to get the second one was worth losing two stockpiled food freights. At the end I irrigated my Silk center tile back to Wheat and Cloth popped up - but nobody wanted it. Oh well.

BTW, Ali - I had around 20 freights and 6,000 gold AFTER building Apollo. With the research set low I easily made the ship in 24 turns, with about 3,000 gold to spare. My city production topped out at 44 shields with the Silk. I decided not to try to mine forests to get to 50.
 
ElephantU, you are amazing. I did not think it possible that with this geography you could launch that early. I did not try OCC fearing that I may not be able to launch before it is too late.
 
I just finished my OCC last night. Launched in 1710, landed 1725. I thought about launching in 1700 with a 15-2-2-1-1-1 for an earlier landing date, but went with the "later-date-fewer-turns" approach. I was on a much tighter budget to get the spaceship off the ground than the esteemed Pachyderm as I think I only had 17 vans and about 3000 gold before building Apollo. At one point I was down to less than 200 in the treasury while building the Modules, but I was saving my few remaining caravans to build the components.

Some old habits die hard: I went for 80s production on the structurals even though I could barely support it - I had to disband all (...er...both ;) ) supported units - and it also sent me into a huge food deficit. However, right as I did the three Grass-to-Hills transformations, I had a hiccup in my research due to a jump in my power rating that forced me to lose a turn or two, so I actually ran out of food and specialists before building the last structural. I had to disband an old none unit to finish the 15th structural in one turn because I had to turn the Silk into Wheat to avoid dropping below 20 citizens.

The food shortage cost me a few citizens. I probably could have flattened the hills back down and gotten my pop/score back up a little, but I didn't feel like bothering with it. After launch I put the silk back for a few turns to build a couple unnecessary 80s and 160s defensive improvements and a Stealth and by then I had enough cash to complete 3 or 4 obsolete wonders at the end.
 
Ali Ardavan said:
ElephantU, you are amazing. I did not think it possible that with this geography you could launch that early. I did not try OCC fearing that I may not be able to launch before it is too late.
The "relaxed time scale" at King level makes the dates look much better. Under a deity timescale my launch date would have been in the mid-1800s. Also being on King level made early happiness less of a problem and made the wonder race a non-issue, whereas on Deity I'm not sure I could have taken all the wonders in the order I did, and I might have even lost one or two because of the poor early production.
 
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