GOTM #9 *Spoilers* Thread

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Turn 117: we have the Lighthouse, set for Harbor. Asyut founded. Galley with settler finds anotherjungle island in the east.

Turn 118: setller unloaded in the east - guess what: another iron and a river

Turn 119: get the Great Lib, set to settler.

Turn 120: Persepolis builds Great Wall. sell Literature to Japan for 122 Gold. If theys have Temples only, they must ahve around 20 cities at least by now to have so much more culture! Research to 0, settler in east moves inland. grassland and hut found.

Turn 121: settler from Pi to north (iron!!!) Avaris founded. Now where to put the FP?????

Turn 122: Japan establishes Embassy

Turn 123: settler from El-Al to southern tip of island, settler from Thebes on ship. Ship in east finds border!!!!

Turn 124: barbs in the norht, settlers from Giza and Byblos to Alex, Lisht founded near iron. Aztecs give Horseback Riding and Maths and Territora Map for Contact with Japan - no thanx, better next turn when i get Riding from Great Lib Aztecs are a little better in power and culture than we are

Turn 125: barb attacks and dies. find light green border.

Turn 126: We find Poly, settler from Memphis goes south. Sell contact with Japan and Literature to Aztecs for contact with America, Germany and 53 Gold. 210 Gold from Japan for three contacts. Japan is the big boss atm, followed by the Aztecs, then Germany and me, then Persia and America, both weak. Power: America and Japan and persia equal, then Germany, then me and Aztecs. settler landed near Asyut.

Turn 127: get Construction, Code of Law, Republic from Great Library. disband barb camp.

Turn 128: trade world maps to everyone who gives territory map and money. only Japan refuses. Well. Buto founded.

Turn 129: Edfu founded. Pithom founded.

Turn 130: Busiris founded. Two settlers start their sea trip east.

Turn 131: barbs near Avaris. luckily, Warrior finished Japanese Galley near Asyut

Turn 132: Uprising near Avaris - had to come ( Horsemen!!! Rush Spearman. Why can't they develop monarchy?????

Turn 133: and here comes currency and Monarchy but i do not know how I can cathc up before Edu.... land a settler near Avaris, away from barbs. risky, but i can't wait for the Japs to come there.

Turn 134: Kahun founded. All the barbs go for Avaris - sure. Why can't we have a GOTM with them on sedentary???? Or at least roaming??? doesn it ahve to be raging??? Oh, this is roaming??? then why do I get them all the time????? there's more barbs on the Avaris island, I'll either loose my settler or get plundered... let's see what i can buy to minimize damage.... Monotheism.. for 989 Gold and 18 per turn

Turn 135: the barbs all come across the river and die - puh!

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

OK, if you read through all that rambling:

Why do other people try to attack Japan? In my game, they are so strong that I have to watch out and keep them from attacking me! If I land 20 or 30 units on their island, I may be able to take a city - but they can outproduce me no sweat! Also, how can someone have had a culture lead early on?

What have I done wrong???????

 

[Cruise]

Why post everything you did on every turn. IMO the point of a spoiler thread is to tell stories and share experiences. Not going into details like these no one will look at because they're not fun to read.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Originally posted by EEKthedog
Why post everything you did on every turn. IMO the point of a spoiler thread is to tell stories and share experiences. Not going into details like these no one will look at because they're not fun to read.

You have a point there, what i do hope for is that some may read it all and tell me what it is they'd have done different.

If you don#t like it, skip it!

Also, this can be replayed and prooves I didn't cheat in any way - I'd like to see that from some others here.......

 

[col]

Well my start looked pretty similar - except Persia wiped out the Aztecs very quickly, expanded fast and grabbed all the wonders. Japan was so strong when I met them that I had little chance of ever attacking. I founded a city on the island. Ferried swordsmen back and forth - and lost them all when Japan swatted the city like a fly with a flood of horsies and swordsmen.

I wasnt ever in position to make a run for dom/con

 

[Cartouche Bee]

Originally posted by Lt. 'Killer' M.


You have a point there, what i do hope for is that some may read it all and tell me what it is they'd have done different.

If you don#t like it, skip it!

Also, this can be replayed and prooves I didn't cheat in any way - I'd like to see that from some others here.......

Well I liked your reasoning on the first move. I moved my worker on the hill to scout and decide to move the first settler to the west so it had access to the coast and immediate access cattle.

We did things different from there, I wanted rapid expansion and to be able to eliminate Japan.

I have ROP with all civ's and since I did not raze any of the Japanese cities they are all still on polite terms. I get about about two world maps and 10 gold each turn for my territorry map. I rank 1st on 9 out of 13 catagories in the demographics screen.

A picture is worth a thousand words so, postion at 770AD.

CB

 

[cracker]

CB,

Your approach sounds almost identical to mine. I have been milking the game for all its worth from about 2000 BC on. I beelined for the Great Light and Lib combo and then switched to zero science. With the industrious workers and lots of slaves I could strip the jungle and setup for 100% forestry as soon as engineering came on line.

I had a four or five city beach head on Japan's northern tip when they attacked me so I then counterattacked straight toward Kyoto which was the only city I could see at the time other than border cities because the shogun wanted something unholy for a map.

Unlike you, I raised many Japanese cities because I was behind in culture and needed to conserve limited numbers of WarChariots to continue the attack.

Killing Japan early and building the FP in their zone may be key to converting our losing start position into a winner.

I would emphasize again than I have raised tedium to a new art in this game since I am micro managing worker tasks and civilian worker assignments in every turn. In 1300AD, it is taking me an average about 1 hour per turn just to manage all the workers since the governors and autmation functions do not work to maximum effect.

Here's my mini-map from 750AD to compare to your position:

 

[cycle]

Wow !

This is my first game at emperor and my first gotm. So far, I'm doing ok. I'm second to last in overall score but my civilization is doing well. Current date is around 1400 AD. I'm in the first third of the middle age in techs.

Here it goes :

In the beginning, I concentrated on warriors to scout the area and settlers to control territory as fast as I could. When I realized I was alone on my island, I built settlers like crazy. Later on, I finally got map making and started exploring. I met Japan. From the beginning, they were very agressive and we had a war early on. Thanks to my swordsmans, their invasion didn't go too well and they didn't do any damage. I was able to colonize the tiny island north-east of our starting position, and then the slightly bigger one north of it. At some point, I shared it with the Japanese. Another war erupted and I quickly conquered the island, thanks to my steady flow of reinforcements. During this conflict, I met the Aztec who joined the effort with the Japanese. Argh ! Bribery from the Japanese part for sure. Couple of turns later, I bribed the Aztec for peace and they accepted. North of this island, there is a much bigger island. The Aztec had a few city there, on the east side of it. I started to send settler to colonize the west side of it, as well as the central "choke point". Such be usefull strategically later on. Interestingly enough, there is now 4 civs on this island.

When I finally traded for contact with other civs, I quickly realized that I was very late in tech and wouldn't be able to catch on for a while. At best, I would get one tech every 7 or 8 turns, if it was widely known by other civs. I decided to try something new : set research to 0%. I now generate 150 gold per turn. Nice. So far, I buy 1 tech from the Aztec (the smallest of my rivals) every 3 or 4 turns. I am slowly catching up in tech. We will see how it goes.

My current priority is to finish grabing some land in the northern island. I just got gunpowder and there is saltpepper there, which I don't have on my main island. I need to grab it fast. The Japanese will be a major problem in this game with their huge island east of ours. Invading them won't be easy and cannot be achieved before infantry and artillery, I think. I will play defensively until then, which shouldn't be any different than how I've been playing so far

I love this game so far. First time on a large map, I usually play on standard size. First time also on this kind of land/water settings. Should create some nice naval battle in the modern age.

This is also the first time that strategic ressource do make a difference in how I play. I only have iron on my main island. I have 1 horse on the second northern island, and now I'm going for saltpepper on the bigger northern island. Luxury are also pretty rare, and usually I have to give them or 'suffer the consequence'

I hope I can finish this game before the deadline at the end of the month. Each turn take some time, and only 20 days left.

I will be surprised if I survive this game, considering how late it is (1400 AD) and how small my civ is, in number of cities and territory, compared to the other ones.

Until next time, happy civ-ing !

 

[Cartouche Bee]

Hi cracker,

I'm not expecting to be managing workers that late in the game. At 770AD, I'm clearing jungle on the larger Island over by the Persians and 'all' my other currently owned territory is completely groomed (no railroads yet.) The ICS type build that I have going on, on the outer fringes has slowed my control of lands but I'm just getting set to beach head on the Persian Island and a spot over between the Germans and Americans. I've got 60 workers (not including captured workers) and 12 settlers on route to new pastures. I am pretty deep into building up my infrastructure and have completed some universities and have a lot of marketplaces starting to come on line. Once I embroil the rest of the world into war I will turn on the research and leave them in the dust.

It will be interesting to see if I can catch up to your lead from this point. There should be some high scores posted for this map, it will make the current HOF entries (about 12000 points right now,emperor) pale by comparison.

CB

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Cartouche bee, could you post a screenshot of your power graph please? Power and Culture? I'd like to see how the other nations expanded.

I can see how having the cattle from the start makes quite a difference. I restarted, did as you did and found my expansion a lot faster due to the different placement of the following cities. Especially my Memphis sucked.

Thanx a lot!!!!!

 

[Beard Rinker]

Cartouche Bee

Your mini-map shows around 30 cities on the staring island. In my game there are 12 cities on the start island. This brings ICS style to a whole new level.

 

[Cartouche Bee]

Sorry forgot graphic see next post.

 

[Cartouche Bee]

OK, Lt. 'Killer' M., power chart at 810AD. The Americans are my biggest threat and have skirted war against the other nations. My power chart continues to grow and as cities finish universities they start producing units.

Beard Rinker, well there are many many turns left and when milking you can take better building sites later in the game and eliminate poor sites that served their purpose earlier in the game. By grabbing coastal sites early I can get points for that terrain.

edit: forgot the graphic.

 

[Cartouche Bee]

Culture chart, culture was important to be able to take Japanese cities without razing them. I also built my FP (with a great leader) towards the center of the island so that when I got to the larger Japanese cities my FP would counter the culture distance calculations against the Japanese culture centers.

Keeping a spotless reputation early makes it possible to get into strong positions later. Of course there will come a time when reputation gives way to practical solutions.

 

[Sultan Bhargash]

Ouch. My map remains the one island and two small colonies, my score power and culture columns remain thin straight lines, but at least it turns out this is indeed emporer. I am in the 1600s and if by chance I am allowed to be voted for in the UN (I won't be building it) I should probably win. Thanks to all who posted maps and charts of their own success. Gives me something to think about.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Cartouchee: that power thing explains a lot! In my game, the Japanese were twice as strong as anyone else by around 1350 BC!!!! No chance ever to go for them! They must ahve gotten a settler early on from a hut, and lucked out on the barbarians, too!

Thanx a lot, i really didn't get how others could fare so much better, despite me getting the Lighthouse (for which i did have to curtail expansion a bit, but that never hurt overseas expansion, I jsut kept pockets on the starting island empty).

 

[Cartouche Bee]

Originally posted by Lt. 'Killer' M.

Thanx a lot, i really didn't get how others could fare so much better, despite me getting the Lighthouse (for which i did have to curtail expansion a bit, but that never hurt overseas expansion, I jsut kept pockets on the starting island empty).

I think that is an important point! When you know you control your island and you have no threat you can push your expansion toward the areas that are more likely to be in contention. Once I got map making I wanted to explore to see what was in the immediate vicinity and grab lands in those other areas. You can back fill areas later when the pressure to expand starts to dwindle as expansion opportunities start to dry up.

CB

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Yeah this is where i was in my game, but i knew I wouldn't find time to play on and finish, so I'll just do that for fun somewhen later. Will be interesting to see what happenes, actually, the trends ont he graph stopped for me and I started catching up Especially Japan didn't use it's strength to gain a huge culture lead - remarkable! I'd have build culture, culture, culture in their place, to have tio easier with conquests later on.

 

[cracker]

CB,

Here's my power graph from 810AD for comparison to yours.

We were operating on very similar major strategies with differences in implementation. You seemed to be more ICS with settler flood while I was going expansionist with settler flood.

Note the difference in timing of the conflict with Japan. Mine was earlier because of the 4 city beachhead on the north tip of Japan. This led to conflict with Japan attacking me much earlier than in your game.

Note also the slope of the power demise for Japan. Your approach gave you more power to terminate them quickly while my approach seemed to drag on for ever and ever.

Japan was really a tactically wierd situation because they seemed to deliberately be building too few culture improvements and way too few horsemen. In retrospect, I was their only contact and I refused to trade techs with them because my strategy to get the Library.

This is the first game I have played where I can see the great library/great lighthouse combo as being an absolute killer combo on archipeligo maps. Since I get all their techs for free, there is no need to give in to the ridiculous, one-sided trade demands of the AIs and there is no need to make peace with them in order to harvest their advanced technologies.

 

[Raven1er]

damn cracker....thats pretty good