GOTM60 First Spoiler

[Cactus Pete]

GOTM 60 First Spoiler

Reading Requirements

Stop! If you are participating in GOTM 60, then you MUST NOT read this thread unless EITHER

• You have reached at least 1 AD in your game, OR
• You have submitted your entry

Posting Restrictions

• Please do not disclose ANY events or information gained post 1 AD.
• Please do not reveal your final result if that happened after 1 AD.
• Please do not discuss the location of resources that may not show up before 1 AD.
• Please do not name civilizations that requires caravels to contact.

 

[raistlin1967]

How the heck does Alex get a combat 4 sword without warring anywhere else?

 

[enKage]

Barbarians?
Exp 0, 2, 5, 10 . He is also aggresive - so starts with C1 - he needs only three promotions (2,5,10 exp, the highest exp gained when killing barbarians)
They are close to arctic, favorite barb place

 

[Fluroscent]

Started this game with great expectations. I have always liked always war, and have some experience with it. Goal will be a military victory.

First thing noticed is that we are already at war with everyone. No reason to hide then. Scout checks out valley then sees how far it can go outside without getting killed. It managed an epic journey that almost entirely circled the valley before running into a barbarian archer.

Nice valley we have. I settled riverside next to the amazing grass/FP/ivory. No way I was going to avoid having it in my inner ring. Kept sheep+gold in the BFC too.

Teched BW first and built worker->warrior->settler.
Bombay settled 1W of the fishpond, which is now my HEpic city. 3rd city on the wine east, which is my GP farm. Decided against a 4th marginal city.
Archery was teched after seeing no copper or horses, and keeping the hill outside the valley blocked with archers has made the AI not attack so far.

With marble on vanilla, it would almost be criminal not to CS-Sling. So I did just that, and my tech pace has so far left the AI in the dust.
Got Literature+Construction+Calendar+CS+Theology+Currency+MC+Philo+Monarchy, and all prereqs and am two turns from Machinery.
Wonders built are Oracle, GLib, the epics and I managed to found four religions: Judaism+Confucianism+Christianity+Taoism. A culture victory should be a piece of cake now, but I'd rather try to beat down the AI.
The religions are just a byproduct of getting the civics for leveraging the fantastic SPI trait for a game like this.
Popped two great scientists so far, one went to Delhi's academy, the next bulbed Philosophy. Normally I would consider a WE/SSE approach, but with the three safe cities, tons of happiness resources and no stone, I decided against Pyramids. Plus the unlikelihood of Oxford being a major factor, the incentive to settle instead of bulb was low.

Went on the offensive with a stack of phants+cats and so far have taken two small Chinese cities.
Greek lands look better, but I thought better not fight his phalanxes with my phants.
I can see all sorts of units beelining for my newly captured cities on the other side of the mountains, so maybe the advance will be slowed a bit

So far, it seems easy, but I know that once the AI's get alphabet, they will tech much faster as a whole.

 

[Deckhand]

interesting - 5 final spoiler posts and 3 first spoiler posts (at this time)

Started this game with great expectations. I have always liked always war, and have some experience with it. Goal will be a military victory.

Only played always war in one Prince BOTM, and lost/quit.
Still, trying for military victory.

First thing noticed is that we are already at war with everyone. No reason to hide then. Scout checks out valley then sees how far it can go outside without getting killed. It managed an epic journey that almost entirely circled the valley before running into a barbarian archer.

Smart. I was afraid to explore and stayed in the valley except for 5 archers fortified on the hill/forest.

Nice valley we have. I settled riverside next to the amazing grass/FP/ivory. No way I was going to avoid having it in my inner ring. Kept sheep+gold in the BFC too.

Nice valley indeed. Settled SW of elephants, Delhi W of fish, and just built two more cities with granaries and barracks - I think I will need a lot of units. cities 3 and 6 tiles E of Delhi.

Teched BW first and built worker->warrior->settler.
Bombay settled 1W of the fishpond, which is now my HEpic city. 3rd city on the wine east, which is my GP farm. Decided against a 4th marginal city.
Archery was teched after seeing no copper or horses, and keeping the hill outside the valley blocked with archers has made the AI not attack so far.

With marble on vanilla, it would almost be criminal not to CS-Sling. So I did just that, and my tech pace has so far left the AI in the dust.

I took Feudalism from Oracle. Was planning to get CS with Great Prophet (have never done that). But need to discover all the religions first. So, am going to start researching CS after Literature 6 + 16 turns.

Got Literature+Construction+Calendar+CS+Theology+Currency+MC+Philo+Monarchy, and all prereqs and am two turns from Machinery.
Wonders built are Oracle, GLib, the epics and I managed to found four religions: Judaism+Confucianism+Christianity+Taoism. A culture victory should be a piece of cake now, but I'd rather try to beat down the AI.
The religions are just a byproduct of getting the civics for leveraging the fantastic SPI trait for a game like this.
Popped two great scientists so far, one went to Delhi's academy, the next bulbed Philosophy. Normally I would consider a WE/SSE approach, but with the three safe cities, tons of happiness resources and no stone, I decided against Pyramids. Plus the unlikelihood of Oxford being a major factor, the incentive to settle instead of bulb was low.

Pyramids discovered this turn (1AD) IAFAL. Built Oracle and Parthenon. Founded Hinduism. One Great Prophet - settled.

Went on the offensive with a stack of phants+cats and so far have taken two small Chinese cities.
Greek lands look better, but I thought better not fight his phalanxes with my phants.
I can see all sorts of units beelining for my newly captured cities on the other side of the mountains, so maybe the advance will be slowed a bit

My stack of 3 longbowmen, a axe, 2 war elephants and 3 catapults is awaiting 3 more catapults and then I will go on the offensive. Chinese city south of valley, so will start there.

So far, it seems easy, but I know that once the AI's get alphabet, they will tech much faster as a whole.

We will see. I hope CactusPete was nice - it looks like he made it hard for the AIs to get at us and I expect several defensible choke points between "countries".

 

[Dhoomstriker]

First thing noticed is that we are already at war with everyone. No reason to hide then.

Yeah, that part was pretty disappointing. I like to "hide" for as long as possible in Always War games, hoping for an AI-AI war or at least for the AIs not to send stacks our way for a while.

Nice valley we have.

Indeed, it is pretty sick. We don't necessarily even need any other Cities for a really long time, given how many Resources we have access to.

With marble on vanilla, it would almost be criminal not to CS-Sling. So I did just that, and my tech pace has so far left the AI in the dust.
Got Literature+Construction+Calendar+CS+Theology+Currency+MC+Philo+Monarchy, and all prereqs and am two turns from Machinery.

I executed a CS-sling, too, but I don't think that I made it quite as far as you in tech. No Monarchy and no Philosophy, but pretty much all of the rest the same. A Great Scientist due in 1 turn at 100% odds will Lightbulb Philosophy, though.

Went on the offensive with a stack of phants+cats and so far have taken two small Chinese cities.

I attacked a bit earlier, using Archers and Swordsmen. I had some difficulty with China, as they'd hooked up a source of Metal.

That said, by 1 AD I had captured or razed a total of 5 Cities from either China or Greece. I can see some other AIs' stacks on the horizon, though, so I may not have sufficient units to keep my captured Cities. Oh well, I'd rather capture and lose some Cities than not win any at all--the City Revolts from Cities changing ownership will at worst reduce the number of units that our closest neighbours will be able to field against us, and at best, allow me to have forward posisions, so that I won't see 100 units show up at the same time at the pass into our valley.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Barbarians?
Exp 0, 2, 5, 10 . He is also aggresive - so starts with C1

The Aggressive Trait also means that Alex has cheap Barracks, so he likely got started off with 4 experience from his almost-certainly-built Barracks.

 

[Xcalibrator]

My game start is very similar to Fluro's (again--but he always ends up leaving me in the dust ). Same settling spots and also did CS slingshot. Similar techs (I started with Hunting, AH, BW, Wheel, Archery) but he has HBR, Currency, Theo, Philo, and Monarchy on me; I have Music, and am also 2 turns from Machinery (and then going for Engineering). 3 Great Prophets are settled in Delhi and I'm going on a Wonder binge to get GPPs and leverage the National Epic and Parthenon: Henge (2520 BC), Oracle (950), Parthenon (675), Pyramids (525), and Great Lib (325). I ran into Fluro's barb archer warrior inside our idyllic glade --slowed down the settling of the wine city a bit.

Running 100% science (-2 gpt) I'm making 172 bpt with 57 hpt. City pops are 11, 9, 8. I'm just starting to venture into the cold cruel world outside (other than my scout, who nearly completed a circumnavigation of the mountains) and am 3 turns from attacking my first AI city, the Chinese one to the SW SE with stone, horses, and silver. I've never played Always War, but things have been very quiet so far. What hell will I unleash with this small act, I wonder?

Fun map and scenario, CP!

 

[Cactus Pete]

"Fun map and scenario, CP!"

That was the plan. Appreciate the positive feedback.

 

[PutCashIn]

I also managed to sqeeuze in 4 cities, and attacked Alexander first with the usual Cats and Phants, razing cities as I went, can't quite remember how far through him I got at 1AD, but my plan was to take him out completely and then move on to Mao, then see if I have any chance against the remaining AI's.

 

[billybgame]

I finally got this GOTM to work and am at 1 AD. I settled E of the Dye, then Bombay, N of Marble. Madras next to the E, then Bangalore in the SE corner.

Was starting to fret, when no Horses or Copper. Started an archer and settler towards the horses by the Chinese start, only to see them plop down a few turns earlier. My culture from Bangalore has already robbed them of the Stone(though I could not believe they had not quarried it yet!). Not sure what I'm going to do about that one yet. But, anyhow, was elated to see the Iron pop up right next to Bombay.

I have at least 10 guys on my fort forested hill. Many archers/spearmen/axemen/warriors and a swordsman. I'm in the score lead, and I think in the tech lead, so I may try to win in a peaceful manner(well, at least me not attacking). I think attacking will surely lead to vulnerability, being at war with everyone. I did not get to divulge the whole map with my scout, but I'm sure any captured cities would be readily available for attack.

The one thing that did go wrong, and it seems like I was the only one, was I did not get the Oracle. I sure could have, but I was trying to do the CS Slingshot, and Cyrus built it 3 turns before I got Code of Laws. I could have built it 15 turns before that, too.

Guess I have some pondering to do on possible Victory. I do have 2 religions....hmm..

 

[MarleysGh0st]

I can't recall playing an Always War game before. This should be...interesting.

I moved into Shangri-La and began settling it. I made one huge blunder settling Madras; I had noticed that I needed a city next to the fish in order to build a work boat, but then I forgot about that when the time came and built one space closer to the mountains (for the feeble reason of expanding the fat cross across the mountains). No fish for me!

After exploring the valley, my scout went into the wilderness, discovered Writing in a goody hut, and then promptly got eaten by a bear.

I saw the China was weakest in score and had its nearby cities weakly defended, so I sallied forth hoping for a quick conquest. Two cities were captured quickly enough, but then my attack force ran into stacks from Catharine and Kublai Khan. With their help, Mao recaptured one city. Catharine razed the other.

So, at 1 AD, I've built Calcutta on the hill outside the valley entrance, to serve as my defensive outpost. There are a lot of enemy troops on the way!

 

[kcd_swede]

1AD spoiler; GOTM60

Challenger (Emperor) save for me. Why? Well, back in WOTM29, Leif made an ”always war” Monarch level game – after hearing I committed to playing a challenger save. OK… it wasn’t really truly always war… but with Ragnar and Monte and Aggressive AI, it might as well have been. I did not win that one, but it was fairly close. Anyhow… Emperor/always war is right on the edge of what I think I can win regularly. So I still have something to prove, and maybe am holding a little bit of a grudge. I’m also thinking that a Shangri-La valley of protection is a big enough edge to tip the scales compared to my Shaka fiasco. OK… Bring it on!

Needless to say, I’m going into the valley. I don’t think the intro to this game leaves much doubt as to there being nice resources there, and only one entrance. Too much to pass up. On opening the save, my first reaction is ”TROUBLE!”… all the AI already have contact with us. ” To me that screams: “we’d better find them before they find us.” And sent my scout on a one-way mission to do just that, before getting eaten by bears.

I settled on the river just south of the desert hill (1sw of floodplains elephant), to get the gold and the mentioned special bonus tile. Now my second reaction is: “This valley is SMALL!”. OK, guys, size isn’t everything… but still, bigger would not have been unwelcome. At least dot-mapping is made easy.

View attachment 272615

My plan will be to develop this awesome valley, establish an insurmountable tech advantage, and then seek out and destroy. But in the back of my mind I’m thinking… “wouldn’t it be cool to get a space victory in an always war game? I bet not many others will manage that!” Hmmm… sounds like I’m already losing focus on the main objective… Just win.

First things first: My first wave should be axemen rush. Just “raze in the first phase”, don’t try to hold. However, this planning is seriously thrown off by absence of copper. No horses, either. I see both on the map, but I’m not going out there to get any. OK, lets aim for mace rush then, getting as much as possible before longbows show up. Pray for iron.

Build the Oracle in 1440BC, gaining me Civil Service. Now I have bureacrazy production in Dehli. Oh yeah… here’s my dot-map, squeezing in 4 good cities that can use every single tile inside the valley. Here is the map from 525BC. Note, at this point I have killed 1 archer, 1 warrior, and 4 wolves. Not lost any units other than the starting scout. My army consists of 1 sword, 2 axe, 1 spear, and 4 warriors. My wise men have not even figured out how to string a bow, yet. (This was a little nerve-wracking having only 4 warriors, no metal, no horses, and no way to whip an archer while building Oracle, I must admit.) Going lean, all the way.

Note, after Civil Service, I beeline machinery to get maces… thus IW was next, revealing the Iron (and designating my second city Bombay as the eventual Heroic Epic city). Whew, prayers answered. In the 525bc shot above I have already enabled maces, though not yet built any. Why waste time on Pyramids in a war game you might ask? Well… I’m thinking initially that Repr will get me the tech lead I need to withstand an onslaught of inferior units. But long-term, without Police State for the army build bonus and war weariness bonus, I’ll get beat down if it’s a long game. Of course, the realy good players are now laughing at me and thinking… if you are planning for a long game, building the Pyramids is one way to guarantee it.

At 525bc I’m learning Monarchy… usually redundant with the Pyramids, but we have wine and every happy face is going to count. Besides, no AI has alphabet yet, so I’m surely way ahead of them and can afford the short detour. Need it for longbows eventually anyhow. Note, at 1AD, no AI has alphabet yet STILL!!! I teched it myself to see just how ignorant they are, and discover that they are very backwards indeed.

My tech path was thus: Hunting >BW>AH>Poly(found Hindu in Dehli)>wheel>fish>Pott>Mason>Writ>PH>CoL(found Confu in Madras)>CS(by Oracle)>Agri>IW>MC>Mach>Mon>Math>Constr>Alpha>Sail>Calendar>Archery>start Feudalism (0AD)

So you can see I focused on two things: getting the military techs I needed for a mace/cat romp, and getting the techs needed to develop my tiles. Archery not discovered until 0AD, just before Feudalism. Yes folks, I will not build a single regular archer this game.

My first sortie was mace/cat with spear and war elephant protection against archery/bronze units. I could go left to Greece or go right to China. Flip the coin… Greece it is. Unlucky coin flip, maybe. Not really a coin flip… Greece had a world wonder, and China didn’t. Ok ok… how much use will I get out of the Great Lighthouse in an always war game where my core cities are tucked inside a mountain range? Oh well… I expect I’ll be taking on China soon enough anyhow. Notice, that since axe rush was out of the picture, the raze phase never was to be. I can beat anything they can throw at me. I’ll take and hold whatever I can. Better to fight them over there than over here, as the Yanks would say.

At 150BC I have captured (and kept) Sparta, my first conquest of the game. I expect the military picture to heat up considerably at this point, but I’m ready for it. I hope.

 

[WelshGandalf]

Built 4 cities inside the valley. Founded everything except Buddhism and Islam (the latter no-one has yet). CS-sling too. Going for a culture victory.

Am about to settle on the fur/wheat space southwest of the exit. Have taken Sparta with some lucky victories (only had 2 swordsmen and an axeman against 3 archers). They have the lowest score, I have the highest. Crapload of temples/monasteries have been built. Figured I'll try to get at least 6 cities so I can get 2 cathedrals of every religion. Just got machinery - macemen are coming forth! I can't see much in the way of enemies attacking me... yet... Music & then Islam will be my next priorities.

 

[ElWanderer]

I wouldn't normally play non-BTS Civ 4, but the description/set-up of this one hooked me in. I just hope I have the time to finish it.

I settled inside the valley, pulled off a CS-sling and no one has dared to attack my small blocking force... I'm surprised how quiet it has been on that score. It's almost disappointing considering how I went for Iron Working early on seeing there was no copper. Meanwhile, I'm building up a stack to go and attack Greece. Reading some of the posts above, I suspect I'm going to be rather late to that party.