GOTM63 - Final Spoiler

[civ_steve]

GOTM 63 Final Spoiler

Tell us how your Zulu did as they entered the later Ages.

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[PaperBeetle]

The Ancient and Medieval Ages
I used Zimbabwe to produce 6-turn settler combos, mostly filling the zulu peninsula, and also expanding east across the gulf to grab the handy horses and luxuries over there. Although the Arabs dowed me early, my first real war was swords into the Quois at the end of the ancient age. I reached the medieval in 470bc, with 7 turns of anarchy before the republic was ready. Trading Republic for scientific free techs got me Engineering and Feudalism, and I researched my way up the top of the medieval tech tree. An impi-initiated golden age kept research speed high, and in republic, Zimbabwe was refitted into a science powerhouse, using the gold and building Copernicus. The AI helped my research to the tune of Invention, but apart from that I had to research the lower branch too. I finished the Quois off towards the end of the medieval, and in the final siege I earned a leader who put the FP in Salamanca.

Free Tech Bonanza
I reach the industrial in 490ad, and much as I would like to gift the scientific civs up, I dare not, for there are many long-standing wonder builds going on, and I can't risk not having Newton in Zimbabwe. My build is due to finish in 3 turns, so I set full research to Steam for a couple of turns, and only in 510ad do I start dishing out the knowledge. Osman gets Steam, and the other three get Medicine. I have to wait another turn before I can afford to buy Steam - it costs me 1710g, but I can use it to get Medicine, and then sell that to Osman to get 1230g back again. Well, that's all the help I can expect in this age. I start researching Sanitation, as I want to grow Zimbabwe large enough to work 20 tiles.

No More AI Wonders
In 540ad, Greece completes Michaelangelo, and all the other AI have to queue up their best builds on Leonardo... but Hlobane will have it 1 turn :sumg:. My Sanitation research is done in 4 turns; Zimbabwe immediately throws up a prebuilt hospital and pops to size 18. With full railroads and a couple more citizens it will do 50spt net of corruption. There's no reason now why I should miss another wonder. After Sanitation, I head straight for Replaceables. I could leave the AI on Electricity while I do the Corporation branch, but I can't guarantee they wouldn't still waste their time doing government techs, and I need the extra worker power quickly. There is so much land to improve, and jungles to clear, and I currently have nowhere near enough shovels.

Military Superpower
Parts arrives in 660ad, and I start off down the Industry/Corporation brach. I have 2 cannon, which I upgrade during the interturn, and then send off to attack India. It is time to continue my eastwards expansion, and take control of the Pyramids. I see a couple of jumbos, but they are easily dealt with by my mighty army... in 740ad I check my military strength, and find I am strong to everyone except Greece and Rome (both average) . My military consists of only 7 cavs, 5 impi, 4 guerilla, 3 swords and 2 arts. By 760ad I am done with India, and I use tech trick to sell the AI up to Industry. I leave the Celts and Arabs out of the deal as I will be annexing these lands next.

Not Scientific? Too bad...
Arabia never really recovered from gifting me two core towns after our cold war in the ancient age. I dow Abu 800ad, and by 820ad the Arabs are reduced to a junk town north of Greece. I let my handful of units rest up a little before they turn north. Brennus gets his dow in 850ad, and also puts up no real fight. The Celts are gone in 880ad, and I have to decide whether to go into Rome as well. If I do, I will be able to reach the last Arabian town, and killing either of those civs will enable me to tech trick again; I didn't do it with the Celts because the AI are still sweating gpt after the death of the Indians.

The Eastern Limit
So it comes to pass that I dow Julius in 970ad. His empire is fairly spread out, but I have a couple of cavalry armies by now, and even a couple of tanks towards the end of the campaign. Rome is gone in 1030ad, and I actually don't bother selling techs, as I have just started my last industrial tech, so the game will end shortly. The Roman lands will be my final eastern province. I take the remaining Arab town in 1050ad, but gift it to Alex for the sake of neatness, and to pump his pop up a little. I want to be sure I know who my UN rival will be... I get up-to-date maps and count the AI's citizens. As expected, Greece has the most (122 to Korea's 91). Everyone seems to have an even spread of city sizes, so I would guess that Greece's population statistic is comfortably ahead of Korea's.

The Price of Fission
I reach the modern era in 1060ad, and each of the scientific AI gets a different free tech! That isn't good, as I am only interested in one of them, and this way I can't even afford a non-monopoly tech to use in trading. I have been stockpiling cash to buy Fission outright, as my per-turn rep is too badly damaged, from tech tricking and some early barb-broken lux trades, to buy it on credit. I have about 15000g, but it isn't nearly enough for Alex to part with Fission. I decide to spend 12000g getting Rockets from Osman, as he is short of a couple of industrial optionals too, but Rockets and 3000g is of no interest to Alex. I am out of options, so I sabotage my UN prebuild a bit and let the interturn end. Happily, the AI trade merrily between themselves in their own interturns, and I can now afford to buy the non-monopoly Fission from Wang, in exchange for Rockets and Sanitation.

Vote Rigging
Now I just need to ally the northern guys against Alex, but I realise I have per-turn deals with him. How sloppy of me! So far I haven't actually broken a deal up front, and I'm afraid my 'supporters' will consider it one abuse too many. I have some cash left, so I try to get Alex to dow me by driving him furious and pulling a careless tech steal, but I just end up with peace and Computers . Oh well, in for a penny in for a pound. I buy his cash for massive gpt, and dow him straight. The other guys don't seem to mind my misbehaviour, and give me MPPs and alliances against Greece at no great cost. In 1070ad I complete UN in Salamanca, and win the vote 4:1.

 

[socralynnek]

Won in 1822 AD a cultural victory. The industrial age was easy, I kept everyone at war with the Greeks, later I steamrolled over India which was enough.

At the end I had only slightly over 1000 culture per turn. I guess I could have done much better.

What worried me a bit was that I had not as many flips as I would have expected. For example, a city the Celts captured form Iros was down to 1 tile for about 150 turns but didn't flip despite me having much more than 4 times their culture...

If no one else chose that condition it could be my first fastest win award...

 

[denyd]

Nice finish Socralynnek - I went the more traditional Zulu way of slash & burn to victory.

I was looking ahead to GOTM 64 and got a whiff of Mongol in the air. I'm not sure that back to back MIL-EXP tribes would be a good thing.

After looking in my XOTM log file, the Mongols have only appeared in GOTM 25 & COTM 10 and the GOTM 25 used the replacement Horse Archer series (a very neat effect BTW), so in reality the PTW Mongols have yet to appear in their natural form.

 

[civ_steve]

Sounds like a pitch for the PTW Mongols to make an appearance. Since we have dropped supporting Vanilla, we can probably do the Mongols. We'll see. (And GOTM25 ... that was a fun month!)

 

[AutomatedTeller]

I assume that's an 100K culture victory? 1000 per turn sounds like it is.

Reason I ask is that I went for a 20K culture (never did the "rush 15 wonders with leaders" thing) and I got it in 1758.

Frankly, I didn't play the game too well - 20K is quite different in PTW than CSC.

AA was create 20K city and get it to size 12, then continue to expand. Expansion was quite slow, of course, since my best food bonus was busy in Zimbabwe

That meant that war took a long time to get going, too.

MA was a little annoying, as I missed HG by a cascade by 1 turn - it turned into an expensive knight, I think. And I didn't go fast to shakes, and i probably should have done that.

The IA saw a ton of war, but not too many leaders. I don't remember how many I got in total, but I think just 2 in the IA - one for Suffrage, one for my FP (finally) in Grand Rapids. Yes, I played half the game without a FP - my research suffered muchly.

The MT went smoothly, but the huge amount of war (killing off rome, arabia, much of greece and celts - at one point, I was at war with all but Celts and otto) produced exactly zero leaders, which was irritating. Cause it did produce a lot of weariness....

One thing that was irritating as hell was the greek navy, in the form of 1 ironclad who managed to sink at least 5 of mine without a problem. Nothing could stop it - even managed to take down a destroyer! was annoying... course, when i finally got bombers and battleships, it went away...

Anyway - 20K in 1758.

 

[socralynnek]

yeah, mine was (as already set as goal in the 2nd spoiler) a 100K victory, not a 20K...

 

[Garvarg]

Domination by default 940AD

I thought I was doing well when I picked up the pyramids, but then I saw the entire map.

Lots of GL helped build FP, GL and more. As I entired the MA I sent my medinf into India territory while I built an army of knights to go after the Celts.
Managed to get the Greeks,Indians, and more against the Romans, but it took longer than expected.
Took out the last city in 880 AD and was amazed to realize I had forgotten about galley bourn settlers. Still being 385 tiles from dom, it was time to rush several temples.

Dom in 940, could have been a lot earlier. Thats what happens when you try to play fast instead of smart.

 

[PrinceMyshkin]

Domination Victory 1280AD
Score: 5170 Jason Score: 8237

After entering the IA in 1050AD, it took me two turns to eliminate the Ottomans. I was only up theory of gravity and magnetism on the ai, so I decided to go after the Greeks next, before they got nationalism as their free tech. The Germans and Romans lacked saltpeter, but the nearby Romans had many knights, longbows, and MI that would kill off much of my offensive force of only 33 calvalry, 16 in armies. I was eight turns from steam with the slider set at 90% and a slight surplus in gpt. I decided to just keep the Romans happy with deals and signed ROP with them as my rep. was still clean, and signed an ma with everyone else against the Greeks. I still wasn't at my support limit due to constant losses. My core was producing cavalry just enough to keep pace with the losses, but it was taking longer to get to the front and I was only halfway to the domination limit. My corrupt cites were slowly building culture, and then producing workers to build rails.

In 1140AD, I had steam and started buiding a railroad to the front, with about 200 workers. The Greeks had proved to be fairly tough, but I had gotten another army with a leader, and finished them off by 1200AD. I rested my troops for three turns waiting for my last deal with Germany to end in 1230AD, while I had the railroad to the German border nearly complete.

By 1265AD the railroad was complete and the Germans were down to three cities, about 120 tiles from the dom. limit. In 1270AD I had eliminated Germany and built the railroad to the Korean border. In 1275AD with the capture of four of Korea's seven cities, I had reached the domination limit and the game ended in Domination victory in 1280AD.

I had a lot of fun in this game and learned quite a bit. I really need to build larger sod's for the start of my wars, instead of ssod's (small stack of doom). I also noticed that my score per turn was fairly high with my happiness slider pushed up as much as I could afford for most of the game. In the end I was gaining 38 score per turn, and I probably could have milked this for a late spaceship victory and a much higer score. But, since I set out for domination or conquest, I decided to finish with domination. I've played Civ for years and only rarely achieved domination on my usual standard, huge continents maps. I only recently got my first ever conquest victory in another game, and I have to admit, it is a lot of fun. My game has improved quite a bit now that I'm not building everything possible in all my cities. I also enjoyed using PTW version for the first time and look forward to more games.

 

[Chamnix]

Welcome to the GOTM world, and congratulations on your victory, PrinceMyshkin!

I also noticed that my score per turn was fairly high with my happiness slider pushed up as much as I could afford for most of the game. In the end I was gaining 38 score per turn, and I probably could have milked this for a late spaceship victory and a much higer score.

Your Firaxis score may have gone up, but most likely your Jason score would have gone down. The Jason score does a very good job of awarding as least as many points for an early victory as you would have earned by continuing to play. Generally, you are best off reaching a victory condition as soon as possible.

My game has improved quite a bit now that I'm building everything possible in all my cities.

Is this a typo? Most people's games improve when they stop building everything possible.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

Garvarg - sounded like most of the domination victories were around then, so it's not too bad!!

 

[PrinceMyshkin]

Thanks, Chamnix, I am happy with any victory.

Is this a typo? Most people's games improve when they stop building everything possible.

Yes, this is a typo, I meant to type "not building everything possible". I'll edit my earlier post.

Your Firaxis score may have gone up, but most likely your Jason score would have gone down. The Jason score does a very good job of awarding as least as many points for an early victory as you would have earned by continuing to play. Generally, you are best off reaching a victory condition as soon as possible.

I think I understand this. In 1275AD, my Firaxis score was 2051, with 256 turns left and gaining 38 points per turn. Even if my Jason score added almost nothing to my Firaxis score, I think I could have beaten my Jason score of 8237 in about 150 turns. I might be wrong, but by 2049AD, I probably would have reached 10,000+ Firaxis score. In 1270AD, my score increased by 33, so my score per turn might have gone up as well. I might not have had the highest Jason score at the end, but surely I could have beaten my Jason score with Firaxis score alone. Of course, I'm just now learning about milking and could be all wrong. I still have quite a bit to learn about this game after many years of playing. I think that's why I enjoy it as much as I do.

 

[Chamnix]

I usually leave this stuff to people smarter than me, but let’s see if I can get this right….

At some point, your increase in Firaxis score per turn would go down because it is an average of all turns played to date. Suppose at 1275 AD you are at the domination limit and your population is not increasing. Your score of 2051 represents an average score over the preceding 284 turns, so you have accumulated 582,484 (2051*284) points total over those turns. After 285 turns, your average score increased by 38 to 2089, so you gained 12,881 points for turn 285 (2089*285 – 582484).

If your population and territory don’t increase, then you will gain 12,881 points each turn for the rest of the game. Your final Firaxis score would be (582,484 + 256*12881)/540 = 7185.

Of course, in reality your population was doubtlessly still increasing, so your Firaxis score would have ended up higher than that, but it is tough to know how much higher.

Also note that a Jason score is not necessarily always higher than a Firaxis score. Jason scoring takes your base Firaxis score, normalizes it to 10000 so that games at different levels are more comparable, then adds an early finish bonus. Because of the normalization, it is not uncommon for Jason scores to be lower than Firaxis scores .

The bottom line is that the Jason scoring system was designed to take into account how much your score would have been likely to increase if you kept playing and award you those points so you don’t actually have to go through the tedium of milking. That’s not to say it’s not possible to improve your score by milking – it definitely is, and the top players can do if they choose. However, it is not likely to improve your score by very much in any case, and for most players (with me definitely being in that group), delaying victory will usually make your Jason score go down.

Hope I didn’t bore everyone too much .

 

[PrinceMyshkin]

Thanks again Chamnix. That reply does help, and I'm glad I didn't take the time required to milk without knowing how it works. I set out for domination and I'm happy with that.

 

[civ_steve]

I'm glad you enjoyed the game! If you 'wish' to read the thread where the Jason scoring system was originally discussed and developed this link will take you there. You can find this link, and other links to GOTM related information threads, in the GOTM reference thread.

 

[PrinceMyshkin]

BTW-thanks for the link to the Jason scoring system and direction to the GOTM reference thread, civ_steve.
The gist seems to be maximize territory, population, and happy faces as fast as possible while getting a good date for whatever victory condition you choose. A very balanced scoring system.

 

[PaperBeetle]

Would I be correct in thinking that the Jason score's "Best Dates" represent the best date expected of a player who is simultaneously attempting to maximise his Firaxis score until the point of victory? Some of the scientific victory best dates seem a bit too generous otherwise.
Also, is the C3C spreadsheet of best dates / modifiers available somewhere? The one on the Jason scoring page only covers PtW.