GOTM77 - Final Spoiler

[civ_steve]

GOTM 77 Final Spoiler - Game Submitted

Reading Requirements:
You may only read this thread if:

1. You have completed and submitted your game.

Posting Restrictions:

1. None! (for THIS contest) As long as its related to the GOTM, and within the forum rules!

[*]Absolutely NO Discussion of any other active 'X'OTM contest!

How did your game finish? Victoriously, I hope. And if not, what areas do you think you might need help with? I'm sure other players will be happy to make suggestions. Finally, what are your opinions about playing the higher difficulty games with a smaller map, vs a larger or standard size? I would like to explore all combinations over time, but I also want to set up fun and exciting games for the widest set of players possible, so I'd value any feedback you can provide.

 

[killerkid]

That was a fun game CivSteve. I have no doubt that there will be quite a handful of victories. I am a lower tier Emperor Player, but even I was able to survive this challenge.

A summary:

I had some early wars with India, but they finally were pushed off our mainland by my tanks. However, Persia was gobbling up civs on the other continent, and soon after it was Persia, me and weak India.

I was 5 turns away from when I planned to launch 2 ICBMs at Persepolis, and sent in a boatload of marines to finish off the stragglers. Then their spaceship would be sabotaged, and they'd have to start all over, giving me time to capture Sidon, home to the UN, and a possible diplo victory for me.

But no, this couldn't be. They finished their Casing and launched their ship when I was 3 turns away from Satelites.

I plan to reload my game and try and get to Satellites quicker.

However, I definitely think this game was winnable, and it will be interesting to see who wins it.

I liked the small map-less AI's to deal with.

Final Result:
Diplomatic loss for Chinese in 1816 AD.
Firaxis: 1818
Jason: 1611

 

[TheHaze]

I managed to get a military victory.

Entry class: Open
Game status: Conquest Victory for China
Game date: 1545 AD
Firaxis score: 5334
Jason score: 7042

The ancient age was pretty tough, the barbarians nearly took me out (lost 2 settlers, 2 workers and some pop). I had built minimum military and that was clearly not a good idea. Short break from expansion building some spears was necessary. Nevertheless I got the upper half of my continent apart from some coastal towns (Persia and Celts).

Techwise I managed to buy myself up mainly with currency (only the celts knew it). That netted me most other techs I was missing. By the end of the Medieval I was tech leader.

On the other continent the French and the Persians were taken out by the Mongols and the Celts. All civs were fighting almost continuous wars which helped me widen the tech lead.

At the beginning of the IA I was getting away building ToE and Universal Suffrage. Then the French (OCC on an island) declared on me landing a spear and a longbow . Thanks for starting my golden age. Soon after I finished the Hoover Dam. Then upgrading all rock throwers to Arty, all horses to Cavalry and all defenders to Infantry.

The rest was combined arms war. First against India taking my continent and finally getting a second core (very late in the game). Then I finished the hopeless French and Persians. Invasion of the other continent - and the Mongols and the Celts went down against my tanks. Finally I had to finish off India that had built a lonely town on a southern island.

Thanks for a fun game.

 

[Lanzelot]

For my earlier writeups see first and second spoiler. Here is only a wrapup of the final phase (which took around 10 turns).

Taking the 8 Mongol cities with Cavalry was a piece of cake. They were defended only by Pikes and a few Muskets. In the course of that campaign I got two MGLs -- now that the game was almost finished... . As I had no real use for them (no great or small wonder currently available, and I knew it was only a few more tiles till dom limit, so no need to save them for later wonders), I created two Armies.

After that I spent two or three turns healing and repositioning my Cavalry and then used a ROP-rape to take five French towns in a sneak attack. Originally I had planned to raze the cities and plant new ones, as France was culturally advanced, but I knew I would need to hold on to those cities only for one or two turns, so I didn't bother. I used the settlers, which I had already prepared, to fill in a few gaps and to put me 20-30 tiles over the dom limit. So even if one or two cities would flip back in the interturn, I would still stay above the limit. Then I hit enter and reached domination in 1060AD. Jason Score 10349.

I just saw ignas' spoiler that he posted earlier today: domination in 210AD!!
Good job ! I really wonder, how you guys do it...!

civ_steve: in this game the happy people of China called on me and enlarged my palace about a dozen times. This has never happened to me in any GOTM/COTM. Is it because for GOTM77 you forgot to "disable" this feature, or had the quality of my play just been to lousy in the earlier games...?

Cheers and thanks for making my current vacation most enjoyable!
Lanzelot

 

[DWetzel]

Entry class: Open
Game status: Spaceship Victory for China
Game date: 1816 AD
Firaxis score: 5599
Jason score: 6473


I'm getting sick of the spaceship wins, but nothing else made sense here. I suck at warfare, and I had it down to 3 civs in the endgame (me, France, Celts), with me controlling the entire home continent and Persia's original lands, and the Celts basically having taken over most of Mongolia. Tried like heck to get a diplomatic win, but it wasn't happening (the third civ would abstain, and I couldn't safely start a war until right near the end.) However, France was by far the better of the competition, and she was even kind enough to research Satellites for me near the end. I probably could have shaved a few turns here and there but I motored through the last 140 game years to finish in time.

I had quite a nice little scientist farm setup in Old India and Old Persia, with a chokepoint (actually, technically two chokepoint cities creating a canal) at the appropriate place in the other continent (basically, southeast of Persia). If anyone wanted to try to come through that (and roughly 3 tank armies each city) they were welcome to. Not surprisingly, they didn't.

 

[tR1cKy]

Republic, revolt, war to India.
I used the Indian dropouts as elite training camp, and it worked.
Got 1st leader -> Hanging Gardens;
After Engineering i stopped research. India had the Great Library in Delhi, so i planned to save money and get some useful techs after the capture. The plan worked perfectly. I also got the leaders to rush the FP in the Indian core and to rush Leo's.
Golden Age, cheap upgrades.
France and Persia were good tech partners during all the middle ages.

I entered the Industrials in 300 AD. Persia got Medicine.
At this point it seems that a very good diplomatic victory is possible, perhaps even pre-900. And things went that way for a while.
I took over the weak Mongolia to get a final leader for ToE building. The leader came. ToE was rushed at the best possible time.
The Persians researched Replaceable Parts, Industrialization and Refining... although they were hard to buy. I simply couldn't believe my eyes.

And so we come to the late industrials.
It's 720 AD and i have just finished Radio. Next turn Persia completes Combustion. We trade. At this point, only 3 techs are remaining.

And from now things go in the worst possible way.
760 AD, i'm about to finish Mass Production. The celts sneak-attack.
They were gracious and we had several treaties involving luxuries and strategic resources. D'uh.

I decided to contain them, without counter-attacking, in order to sign peace ASAP and regain a good attitude with a MPP. It was simply too late to wipe them out.

In 780 AD i complete Mass Production. Persia did the same... in the very same turn as mine. D'uh.

I go for Flight. Meanwhile, i manage to make peace with the celts and regain a good attitude with them. It's clearly me vs. Jerksees so the French and the Celts must both vote for me.

It's 850 AD when i complete Flight. Next turn i spot suspicious Persian movements. I sign MPP with Celts and France. The turn ends and Persia sneak-attacks me. France and Celts declare.

"Great!" i think. It's Jerksees vs. rest of the world, so everyone will vote for me.

I complete the IA in 900 AD without any further help for Persia. They shunned both Flight and Motorized Trasportantion, in favour of Democracy and Amphibious War. Go figure.

Anyway it's still a great date. The prebuild is set up perfectly and if they pick Fission... I sign peace and gift them to the MA. No way. Rocketry. I have to research Fission myself. 9 turns, but it's still 990 AD... at least i thought so.

But it's now that this game becomes a textbook example of Murphy's laws at work. As i said, Jerksees was the clear contender, but in the following turns the Persians performed so badly that they lost completely their edge, and when i completed Fission and the United Nations in 990 AD, the vote was held against Brennus of the Celts instead.

Result: Joanna votes for me, Brennus votes for himself and Jerksees abstains. No majority.

I stared blankly at the screen for a few seconds, then tossed a tremendous profanity in italian (you don't want to hear it, trust me) and quitted the game in disgust, without submitting.

Clearly, diplomatic games are not for me.

 

[Lanzelot]

Result: Joanna votes for me, Brennus votes for himself and Jerksees abstains. No majority.

I don't understand. If you vote for yourself, it should be 2:1 for you, shouldn't it?

Cheers, Lanzelot

 

[Paul#42]

It's the Italian pride. Never vote for yourself (unless you are Silvio Berlusconi ), you can always bribe enough votes and look better

condolences, that's what happens if an AI war endures too long. Strange things may happen then...

 

[Chamnix]

I don't understand. If you vote for yourself, it should be 2:1 for you, shouldn't it?

2 votes out of 4 is not enough. You must either kill the abstainer or get him to vote for you.

 

[DWetzel]

Apparently our awesome skills have broken the game scoring system... ?