I beat Noble

[FengYun]

Well, after coming back to BTS two weeks ago, I've finally beat Noble difficulty in BTS.

It's been a tough but thoroughly enjoyable journey that took a bit of toll on the family. However, I totally kicked ass and damn it felt good (particularly on the night before my birthday)!

My history with Civ4 hasn't been very long. I started out probably 1 year ago playing perhaps a total of 5-10 games on Settler then Chieftain. It was fairly easy but suffered usual problems such as lack of commerce/happiness/health.

Due to life, I lost time and interest in the game but for some reason, I started again two weeks ago after finally securing a study room in my house (yes!). I really forgot how addictive the game was and after refreshing m knowledge, I easiy won a victory on Warlord within a week (something I didn't get past before I quit). This made me think how I'd go on Noble and yeah... guess what... I got my ass whooped.

I played 3 games on Noble in the final week coming last in the first one (just got overwhelmed by AI teching and army growth), coming first in the secon game but got ganged upon by 2 AIs and then destroyed and coming second in the third game lasting until someone started building a spaceship part (WTH?!!).

So I rage quit and started watching YouTube videos. And hey, this is where the breakthrough came from. You know, despite all the words and texts and guides I read, nothing beats watching a pro in action.

The video I watched was an early rush using Egypt and War Chariots. Damn it was nicely done and I learnt so much from just 1 hour of watching (not completing the video). I learnt about importance of food in rushes, workers to build roads towards my targets, researching wealth/science and just overall confidence of being aggressive to win.

Following this strategy, I went Ethiopian on a standard game and boy it was full out rush from start to the end. Got a good start with two corns and then linked up to some copper. Whipped a bunch of Axes and bam, there goes Egypt and Thebes is mine. Started my roads towards Asoka which had 2 cities by now and again, bam, it was like taking candy from a baby. Asoka had this beautiful city called Delhi that I colonised which had an absurd amount of hills that I was just dying from joy. Finally, I eyed my third target Shaka. Now Shaka had 3 cities by now so it took me a bit longer but razed 1 and then took over the other two (had to cut off his copper supply first which was so damn easy).

By now, I had 4 capital cities and pretty much controlled the entire top part of the map and from this point onwards, it was just consolidation/(dodgy) specialisation and growth in size and army.

The rest was just history with my growth outstripping my enemies 2 to 1, destroying Boudica, Kublai and finally Napolean. Funnily, Kublai declared war on me 2-3 times never actually sending much of an force to threaten me. Must be all my spearmen on the hills that scared his horses bwhahaha.

But it was such a rush with Napolean getting a bit bigger than I was comfortable once and nearly vasseling Kublai. Luckily I got him first

All in all, what good fun. Going to give things a rest and refine my skills a bit more to practice my rushes and turn my rush skills into an aggressive/expand strategy.

I'll post some more of my highlights in a later post to help others figure out how to beat a Noble but I thought I'd share my story first since there isn't that many stories out there about victories on Noble but more around how hard the jump is from Warlord to Noble (which is very much the case as I experienced it).

I'd also like to post a save so others can point out where I went wrong or could improve. By the way, can you actually see my game play out turn by turn? If so, how?

In the meantime, some pictures of my victory below!

 

[mrrandomplayer]

Ideally, you would take pictures throughout the game and upload them onto an image uploading website such as ImageShack.

Congratulations!

 

[Macksideshow]

You played a good game, your opening really set it up and it was yours to lose after that. I'm surprised you managed to keep your economy afloat taking so many cities early.

I'd say you probably built too many coliseums and markets. Try trade for luxuries and build more forges instead.

Watch your civics, you probably wanted vassalage and theocracy at that last change for promos rather than free religion and free speech, your commerce/science was dominating, it was time to push for the win. And you could have switched to mercantilism or free market at some point, I didn't notice too many great people popping, an early merc boost would have helped perhaps but I'm hazy with civics.

But really your opening set up the win and you played it out well to a decent finish date/score. Try Prince now.

 

[GreekAnalyzer]

Ideally, you would take pictures throughout the game and upload them onto an image uploading website such as ImageShack.

Congratulations!

This ^^^
AND.....




Welcome, Young writer, to the land where the strong control all and the weak "cultured" people burn, where the advanced destroy the primitive, where the UN is a tool for world domination, where democracy is just a means of building things quicker while communism is the most effective economy for large empires more often than not, where those who conquer the quickest and than keep control of their spoils are the most respected, where men love to start as cavemen on their trip 2 the cosmos, the heavens fall twice with incantations of unbelievable power, where the ultimate religious authority is a white, radioactive rock that can burst forth sometimes with the radiance of a thousand suns[1], where the forecast is continued war in a hell-hole of eternal war against EurasiaEastAsia with a 100% chance of mushroom clouds, or have been forced to abandon their own home due to thermonuclear warfare for the stars. All at the dance of those voyaging writers, who place with the lives of trillions for the purposes of their game.

This is Civfanatics. Only The the strong will flourish under its members iron rule and titanium fists. The weak will be perished, the strong ganged on, the cunning survive.
Do you have what it takes, Oh maybe wise and definately greedy writer?

 

[baseballpie]

Welcome, Young writer, to the land where the strong control all and the weak "cultured" people burn, where the advanced destroy the primitive, where the UN is a tool for world domination, where democracy is just a means of building things quicker while communism is the most effective economy for large empires more often than not, where those who conquer the quickest and than keep control of their spoils are the most respected, where men love to start as cavemen on their trip 2 the cosmos, the heavens fall twice with incantations of unbelievable power, where the ultimate religious authority is a white, radioactive rock that can burst forth sometimes with the radiance of a thousand suns[1], where the forecast is continued war in a hell-hole of eternal war against EurasiaEastAsia with a 100% chance of mushroom clouds, or have been forced to abandon their own home due to thermonuclear warfare for the stars. All at the dance of those voyaging writers, who place with the lives of trillions for the purposes of their game.

This is Civfanatics. Only The the strong will flourish under its members iron rule and titanium fists. The weak will be perished, the strong ganged on, the cunning survive.
Do you have what it takes, Oh maybe wise and definately greedy writer?

^This

 

[mrrandomplayer]

This ^^^
AND.....




Welcome, Young writer, to the land where the strong control all and the weak "cultured" people burn, where the advanced destroy the primitive, where the UN is a tool for world domination, where democracy is just a means of building things quicker while communism is the most effective economy for large empires more often than not, where those who conquer the quickest and than keep control of their spoils are the most respected, where men love to start as cavemen on their trip 2 the cosmos, the heavens fall twice with incantations of unbelievable power, where the ultimate religious authority is a white, radioactive rock that can burst forth sometimes with the radiance of a thousand suns[1], where the forecast is continued war in a hell-hole of eternal war against EurasiaEastAsia with a 100% chance of mushroom clouds, or have been forced to abandon their own home due to thermonuclear warfare for the stars. All at the dance of those voyaging writers, who place with the lives of trillions for the purposes of their game.

This is Civfanatics. Only The the strong will flourish under its members iron rule and titanium fists. The weak will be perished, the strong ganged on, the cunning survive.
Do you have what it takes, Oh maybe wise and definately greedy writer?

Definitely.

 

[GreekAnalyzer]

Ah, I remember the day I got that greeting from Daed. Actually I don't....

 

[mrrandomplayer]

I don't think I even got one. I mostly lurked until I started writing Sri Lanka 1 and by then S and T was basically dead.

 

[GreekAnalyzer]

But it has been revived!
*coughs and points to Horse Soldier*

 

[baseballpie]

I did a little. Am I chopped liver?

[Potentially Graphic Picture of Chopped Liver]

Spoiler :