Gotm25-Mongols Pregame Discussion

[Kaiser_Berger]

Originally posted by sims2789
why is it that the Mongol UU's are weaker than the units they replace?

I think the point of the apparent "weakness" of the individual units is that they can be a combined arms force that is far more powerful than the original Keshik. As Cracker stated, generalship was essential to the Mongols, and this unique setup will make us also think much more strategicaly than simply moving a SoD next to an AI civ and rolling them over. Should be quite fun

 

[SirPleb]

Originally posted by Peanut
SirPleb : Did you let them build up to their first cultural expansion first (ie. culture 10+) ? Could that make any difference?

I didn't test that but have done so now. Moving into the city at culture 9 autorazes, moving in at culture 10 gives the option to keep it. (This is with PTW 1.27)

and of course ...

7) Steppe settlers settle steppes. They want to retire with their horses to a plain life on the plains. Plain plains with no forests or luxuries. They should not be confused with the steep settler unit who will only settle on hills and mountains.

 

[Justus II]

Just thinking about the Steppe Settler. If in fact it is an upgrade from our military units to actual Settlers, this could be an unstoppable way to leap to the domination limit. First, of course, by founding multiple towns, we are adding tiles toward the limit, but more significantly, we are taking dozens of military units, and turning them into population points!!! Particularily on an arid map, the potential of maybe doubling our population at that point in time, whether by building new towns or joining them to cities, could be huge.

On second thought, IIRC the eqWorker could not be joined to cities, so maybe Cracker has made it so that the Steppe Settler also cannot be joined to an existing city. Still, by founding mulitple cities, someone who hadn't reached domination yet could quickly "upgrade" their way into dozens of small towns, adding both territory and population.

 

[cracker]

As a special Halloween treat for all you faithful players,

we have a quick Mongol Treat game available for you to play around with:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=67238

If you want to play the Mongol Treat game before you tackle Gotm25. then you can use it as a unit trainer game and go for a little bit of bloody 1 on 2 conquest gaming.

Have fun and don't let the goblins get you!

 

[DaveShack]

Here's an interesting thought on the UU's and the GA. What if it takes victories by all 4 units to trigger a GA? Don't know how feasible that would be from the rules editor point of view, but it certainly would be a way to encourage a balanced horde...

 

[DaveShack]

Originally posted by cracker
As a special Halloween treat for all you faithful players,

we have a quick Mongol Treat game available for you to play around with:

Thanks!!!

[dance][dance][dance]

 

[Peanut]

Originally posted by SirPleb

I didn't test that but have done so now. Moving into the city at culture 9 autorazes, moving in at culture 10 gives the option to keep it. (This is with PTW 1.27)

Sounds like the cunning plan may just work - as long as those hordes wait patiently for the borders to expand first ...

... and maybe ...

8) Steeped Settlers are those veterans who overindulged in the produce of those five vinyards back home at their farewell demobilization celebrations. They ended up staggering into the wrong yurts and woke up the next day very confused and nursing a shocking headache.

... Perhaps we should stop before Cracker steps in and stamps this out ...

 

[Karasu]

... "Stopped Settlers"?

 

[King Of America]

I have been puzzling about how the UUs have both A/D/M and B/R/F values. No other unit has both. My conclusion is that if you attack (that is, “run into”) another unit, the A value is applied. If you bombard (that is, use the B key and pick a tile), the B value is applied. If you attack and win, you will move automatically (assuming you kill the last unit on the tile), but if you bombard, you stay still.

It will be interesting to see if you can bombard and then move. If so, the Bagatur Hordes will be a lot of fun.

Now that cracker has given us a test game, we can actually chek out some of our theories--thanks!

Back to GOTM 25 itslef:

About early wars: Seems to me a few Archer raids might be a good idea to increase breathing room. The Turghaut Cavalry is an upgraded Swordsman, so maybe a few Sword raids might be useful while waiting for Feudalism. I’m taking small campaigns, a city here and there for more space and booty. In fairness, let me say that I plan to play Conquest; these ideas might play out differently against demi-god build levels (then again an early crippling blow might be even more useful there).

Infrastructure: I think a Temple or Marketplace will be needed in big cities before embarking on campaigns. When the MPs leave demi-god level cities, unrest may follow. (I assume this applies to Conquest-level as well—only the AI build ratio is mentioned as changed, nit the human unhappiness factor).

By the way, I think Steppe Settlers are folks who use exercise machines (SteppeMasters...) before attacking. After all, as Gary Larson taught us all "Even Vikings knew the value of a good stretch before attacking"

 

[Hyland]

A small thought about the UU's....
If a unit has blitz, 3 moves, and bombard shouldn't it be able to bombard then attack three times? Assuming it survives of course.

If so theese units are incredible strong. Combined with steppe settlers domination victory is the flavor of the day.

I belive peace will be as imortant as war in this game. To support the mongol hordes we need o make loads of cash or build lots of cities. To do this we need good trade agreements to sell our wine,atleast at the start when we dont have so many cities. Tech bartering will not be a choice if we wage to much war. I belive that we MUST be the greatest nation in the game by the end of middle ages.

Well i'm a first timer GTOM player so i'll go easy on you. Why use up all the beginners luck at once.

Fun facts about Mongolia:
In mid 80's the Swedish government recieved an official complaint about using the word mongoloid to describe a berson with Down's syndrome, this complaint was straight from the Mongolian ambassador.

 

[gozpel]

I believe they are really Step settlers, they tapdance badly outside the foreign governor's mansion until he flees the field and you get that city for free.

Been thinking of the the starting position, and I remember I had a game long ago when I used irrigated wines for 3 cities to share. They all build settlers and warriors in sequence and of course the random worker in between. We will need workers in this game.

I don't remember exactly how I did it, but something like this:

First city use irrigated wines till they get close to 3 pop, then move citizens to shields, second city takes over and up their pop. First city build settler, on to warrior or whatever..third city uses wines for a few turns to up their population. And round we go. This was made without granaries, I decided barracks was better for that game...but then, this is a different game and it maybe won't work.

I really have to check where I put my first 3 cities and they will be close, like 2 tiles in between. But we know nothing or little of the rest of the area outside our first boundaries, but I think my best bet will be to ignore granary this time to build up a fair force of military as well as a decent amount of settlers AND workers.

IF I only could figure out how to utilize all these new units in a nice way, I would be happy.

And perhaps I should just chicken out and go back to Open, I win on Predator but I never felt comfy since I started that...

 

[cracker]

FYI, we have the zipped package of support files for the MAC version of the game.

This zip pack includes the same files that were downloaded for the PC v1.29 setup but does not copy over the necessary sound files to support the new units. There is a copy of the script text file included in the download pack to show you all the file locates and copies that the autoinstaller does for the PC Civ3v1.29 players automagically.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/games/saves/gotm25_files_for_mac.zip

 

[ainwood]

Originally posted by DaveShack
Here's an interesting thought on the UU's and the GA. What if it takes victories by all 4 units to trigger a GA? Don't know how feasible that would be from the rules editor point of view, but it certainly would be a way to encourage a balanced horde...

There is a "Starts Golden Age" flag in the editor for various units. No way of making it so that four victories are needed....

 

[karmina]

My Masterplan?
Well, everything depends on if it will be possible to establish at least a mediocre kingdom plus about a dozend unbound units plus enough money for upgrading at the end of the AA. I'll rather wait a really long time for Construction/Currency discount offers than spending all my saved money on rushing into the MA. GL we will only get with luck - with a leader. As somebody already pointed out, SunTzu is not important, since barracks are cheap and bombarding units don't need them anyway. Workshop would be great of course, but rather improbable without a leader. The Great Wall could turn out useful, too...(although cracker might have given it already to some southern Chinese kingdom, who knows ?)

About the UUs I've talked enough already. All in all, the Mongolian MA should prove that the ideas of Total War and Blitzkrieg not actually originated in the sick brain of a certain selfnamed Greatest Leader Of All Times, whose name I will not utter here...

On a closer look the mysterious Steppe Settlers seem to make some deeper sense indeed:
We are supposed to wreak havoc on our enemies via bombardement, not sparing civilians, right? And we ought to find mostly arid terrain despite our unusual starting position, right? And we at least want to unleash the Horde over the whole map in a short Blitzkrieg. All this might well result in a completely devastated continent, leaving only a couple of lonely villages.
Now imagine some strong far-away civ, perhaps even on another continent. Although we might easily reach the domination tile limit at that point, the population issue will be something completely different...if it wasn't for the Steppe Settlers!

 

[Karasu]

...So, "Pest Settlers"?

 

[alexman]

Originally posted by King Of America
I have been puzzling about how the UUs have both A/D/M and B/R/F values. No other unit has both.

Except Frigates, Ironclads, Destroyers, Battleships, AEGIS cruisers...

 

[cracker]

Originally posted by alexman
Except Frigates, Ironclads, Destroyers, Battleships, AEGIS cruisers...

Yes, you are right. Unfortunately we do not have the ability to engage the lobe of the AI brain that implements naval power strategy, just on land for a unit in the land power mode. Instead we get fixated semi-functional one task units in the AI mode unless we apply a more creative set of solutions at theg ame setup level.

 

[stagnate]

Originally posted by Hyland
A small thought about the UU's....
If a unit has blitz, 3 moves, and bombard shouldn't it be able to bombard then attack three times? Assuming it survives of course.


Bombard takes a move, so bombard and move 2 times, based on all other bombard units that I've seen.

 

[AdrianE]

Does anyone know how these new unique units will work when loaded into an army? Will we be able to bombard with an army?

Any thoughts on what happens if we have a mixed army? ie a Turgut, an Ordu and a Korchin in the same army

I'm thinking that an early war is necessary to get an early army so we can build the heroic epic by the Middle ages.

I think it will difficult to take walled towns with these units. A fortified pike behind a wall is going to be tough. I wonder if Cracker has modded the AI's to build walls more often?

 

[HookEmHorns]

Thanks to Cracker and company for another extremely intriguing game.

My inclination is to settle across the river to avoid wasting a bonus food (probably rare). With a 5-turn settler factory due to shield shortage, Karakorum will only need 3 grass wines for 2 turns and 2 grass wines for 3 turns. A city to the west will use the other wines.

I'll send my warrior to the hill to the north and my scout to the west to see if there's anything in that direction to make my settler move undesirable.

I appreciate all of the discussion on the units. My thoughts lie in the same direction. Another twist is to use settlers to burrow into the enemies territory to maximize the range of the units (see Moonsinger's article on artillery).

My playing time usually starts late and ends much later after my brain is weak. I intend to try approaching this as a succession game, limiting each session to 10 turns (after the first 20). This will encourage me to make the most of the limited turns and give me time to reflect between sessions.

I'll probably play the Halloween surprise in parallel with the GOTM. The knowledge gained from the quick game will be helpful but won't have a great impact on my very early moves.

May Sitatara grant wisdom and long life to all players and staff.