I Came, I Saw, I Conquered! (A Veni, Vidi, Vici Progress & Tales Thread)

[jayjackson]

"I Came, I Saw, I Conquered!" - A Veni, Vidi, Vici Progress and Analysis Thread!

Hello, everyone!

First of all, to the moderators, I wasn't sure if this would be the ideal place for a post such as this, so if after reading you feel it doesn't belong in the Stories/Let's Play forum, I completely understand!

I am a longtime CivFanatics member, but I usually do not really begin trying to start submitting to the respective Civ Hall of Fames until the final expansions and such are out, so I can experience everything competitively under the "final" game. As such, I have just in the past few days started at the run for the Civ V HoF competition known as Veni, Vidi, Vici here on CivFanatics!

For those that are unaware of how the VVV competition works, you need to complete 6 different sub-competitions with HoF-compliant save games. If you have not visited the Civ V Hall of Fame or are unaware of what a compliant HoF save is, please visit this link, also on CivFanatics: http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ5/rules.php

The six sub-competitions you must complete are as follows:

Inferno: Win a game on each of the eight difficulty levels.
Machiavelli: Win a game on each of the five victory conditions.
Go The Distance: Win a game on each of the six map sizes.
Tempi Trophy: Win a game on each of the four game speeds.
Map Quest: Win a game on each of the twenty HoF-compliant maps.
League of Nations: Win a game with all fourty-three leaders.

One save can count for multiple competitions, so the minimum number of games you must win to complete this challenge is 43 games.

I am going to use this thread as both a way to keep track of my progress while also trying to be more involved and active within our community. You aren't allowed to play a HoF map with others, so I won't be posting on games while they are in progress, but I do plan on discussing them after the submissions have been accepted.

I am on a medical leave for unfortunately the foreseeable future (I am okay, I am just unable to work) so I will be extremely active and wanted to really become a bigger part of this community and I felt this was a solid way to do so.

I am reserving the next seven posts for a few minutes so I can setup "progress tracker" posts, and I will be posting about my first game over the next day or so -- our first win for the competition is already in the books, I am just waiting for it to be processed before I begin discussing it.

My first game was on Prince as it was my first game under the final version of the game, but I was a regular Emperor player in Civ IV and while my next game is under King to get a King win on the board, I expect that most of my games will be played at Emperor or higher! I hope this will have value for you in that regard!

Thanks so much for reading this novel, and I hope that this thread can be of benefit to others who wish to improve their game! That is my biggest hope out of doing this is that we can all become better players TOGETHER!

Currently Playing: Pregame Deity Game #1 -- Game #5 Overall!
Last Victory: Casimir III (Poland), Immortal, Standard/Standard, Pangaea - 1947 AD (Cultural)
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[jayjackson]

Veni, Vidi, Vici -- Overall Progress

Inferno: 4 of 8 Games Completed
Machiavelli: 2 of 5 Games Completed
Go The Distance: 2 of 6 Games Completed
Tempi Trophy: 2 of 4 Games Completed
Map Quest: 4 of 20 Games Completed
League of Nations: 4 of 43 Games Completed

ALL VVV Victories

Game #1: Catherine (Russia), Prince, Huge/Marathon, Continents - 1913 AD (Cultural)
Game #2: Hiawatha (The Iroquois), King, Standard/Standard, Arborea - 2006 AD (Science)
Game #3: Sejong (Korea), Emperor, Standard/Standard, Fractal - 1928 AD (Science)
Game #4: Casimir III (Poland), Immortal, Standard/Standard, Pangaea - 1947 AD (Cultural)

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[jayjackson]

Veni, Vidi, Vici -- "Inferno" Progress
Difficulty Levels

Settler: Incomplete
Chieftain: Incomplete
Warlord: Incomplete
Prince: Catherine (Russia), Prince, Huge/Marathon, Continents, 1913 AD (Cultural)
King: Hiawatha (The Iroquois), King, Standard/Standard, Arborea, 2006 AD (Science)
Emperor: Sejong (Korea), Emperor, Standard/Standard, Fractal, 1928 AD (Science)
Immortal: Incomplete
Deity: Incomplete

Once a difficulty level is complete, the game with the earliest finish date will be the game listed for each difficulty.

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[jayjackson]

Veni, Vidi, Vici -- "Machiavelli" Progress
Victory Conditions

Cultural: Catherine (Russia), Prince, Huge/Marathon, Continents, 1913 AD (Cultural)
Diplomatic: Incomplete
Domination: Incomplete
Science: Sejong (Korea), Emperor, Standard/Standard, Fractal, 1928 AD (Science)
Time: Incomplete

Once a victory condition is complete, the game with the earliest finish date will be the game listed for each condition.

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[jayjackson]

Veni, Vidi, Vici -- "Go The Distance" Progress
Map Sizes

Duel: Incomplete
Tiny: Incomplete
Small: Incomplete
Standard: Sejong (Korea), Emperor, Standard/Standard, Fractal, 1928 AD (Science)
Large: Incomplete
Huge: Catherine (Russia), Prince, Huge/Marathon, Continents, 1913 AD (Cultural)

Once a map size is complete, the game with the earliest finish date will be the game listed for each map size.

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[jayjackson]

Veni, Vidi, Vici -- "Tempi Trophy" Progress
Game Speeds

Quick: Incomplete
Standard: Sejong (Korea), Emperor, Standard/Standard, Fractal, 1928 AD (Science)
Epic: Incomplete
Marathon: Catherine (Russia), Prince, Huge/Marathon, Continents, 1913 AD (Cultural)

Once a game speed is complete, the game with the earliest finish date will be the game listed for each game speed.

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[jayjackson]

Veni, Vidi, Vici -- "Map Quest" Progress
Difficulty Levels

Arborea: Hiawatha (The Iroquois), King, Standard/Standard, Arborea, 2006 AD (Science)
Archipelago: Incomplete
Boreal: Incomplete
Continents: Catherine (Russia), Prince, Huge/Marathon, Continents, 1913 AD (Cultural)
Fractal: Sejong (Korea), Emperor, Standard/Standard, Fractal, 1928 AD (Science)
Frontier: Incomplete
Great Plains: Incomplete
Great Plains Plus: Incomplete
Highlands: Incomplete
Ice Age: Incomplete
Inland Sea: Incomplete
Lakes: Incomplete
Large Islands: Incomplete
Pangaea: Casimir III (Poland), Immortal, Standard/Standard, Pangaea, 1947 AD (Cultural)
Rainforest: Incomplete
Shuffle: Incomplete
Small Continents: Incomplete
Terra: Incomplete
Tilted Axis: Incomplete
Tiny Islands: Incomplete

Once a map type is completed, the game with the earliest finish date will be the game listed for each map type.

​

 

[jayjackson]

Veni, Vidi, Vici -- "League of Nations" Progress
Difficulty Levels

Ahmad Al-Mansur (Morocco): Incomplete
Alexander (Greece): Incomplete
Ashurbanipal (Assyria): Incomplete
Askia (Songhai): Incomplete
Attila (The Huns): Incomplete
Augustus Caesar (Rome): Incomplete
Bismarck (Germany): Incomplete
Boudicca (Celts): Incomplete
Casimir III (Poland): Casimir III (Poland), Immortal, Standard/Standard, Pangaea, 1947 AD (Cultural)
Catherine (Russia): Catherine (Russia), Prince, Huge/Marathon, Continents, 1913 AD (Cultural)
Darius I (Persia): Incomplete
Dido (Carthage): Incomplete
Elizabeth (England): Incomplete
Enrico Dandolo (Venice): Incomplete
Gajah Mada (Indonesia): Incomplete
Gandhi (India): Incomplete
Genghis Khan (Mongolia): Incomplete
Gustavus Adolphus (Sweden): Incomplete
Haile Selassie (Ethiopia): Incomplete
Harald Bluetooth (Denmark): Incomplete
Harun al-Rashid (Arabia): Incomplete
Hiawatha (The Iroquois): Hiawatha (The Iroquois), King, Standard/Standard, Arborea 2006 AD (Science)
Isabella (Spain): Incomplete
Kamehameha (Polynesia): Incomplete
Maria I (Portugal): Incomplete
Maria Theresa (Austria): Incomplete
Montezuma (The Aztec): Incomplete
Napoleon (France): Incomplete
Nebuchadnezzar II (Babylon): Incomplete
Oda Nobunaga (Japan): Incomplete
Pacal (The Maya): Incomplete
Pachacuti (The Inca): Incomplete
Pedro II (Brazil): Incomplete
Pocatello (The Shoshone): Incomplete
Ramesses II (Egypt): Incomplete
Ramkhamhaeng (Siam): Incomplete
Sejong (Korea): Sejong (Korea), Emperor, Standard/Standard, Fractal, 1928 AD (Science)
Shaka (The Zulu): Incomplete
Suleiman (The Ottomans): Incomplete
Theodora (Byzantium): Incomplete
Washington (America): Incomplete
William (The Netherlands): Incomplete
Wu Zetian (China): Incomplete


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[jayjackson]

I appreciate that everyone allowed me to get my reserved posts in place, and I now welcome replies and discussion on the thread.

Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope this will provide value to folks. I know I will have fun presenting it, although I must admit that while I've been a guy who has done a ton of "franchise stories" and "dynasty reports" in sports games, this will be my first time doing AAR's. I am able to use both YouTube and am not adverse to starting a WordPress blog if there's a way I can provide better content to the community through this endeavor.

I look forward to interacting with you all soon, and learning more about this great game through at least 43 games with you! Thanks again!

 

[jayjackson]

I'm curious if there are any tools or anything that would make analyzing the games easier once they are accepted into the Hall of Fame?

I zip up my entire autosave files and all manual saves I make, so I will always have access to a save for every turn of the game, I'll just admit I don't know if there's a way to make the analysis of the games go a bit easier! If not, I'll figure something out through screenshots and the saves themselves, but if there's any groovy tool, I'd be indebted to you!

I'm currently still waiting for the submission to be accepted, but I'll start writing on my Catherine win as soon as that is up and ready. It definitely could have been a lot faster, as I won with raw tourism, and could have undoubtedly sped the game up regardless had I decided to take out my neighbor Washington. But, it was a good start, and my first game truly "back" since Vanilla, so I'll take it.

Thanks for any and all input on anything that will make things easier to present to you, and again, thanks for checking out my thread! Sorry that there isn't "content" yet while I wait on the submission, but it will be here very soon!

 

[IronfighterXXX]

I see you started from huge/marathon game

This and time victory are reasons why I wasn't thinking about completing VVV while I actively played.

Anyway, good luck on your endeavor!

 

[jayjackson]

I see you started from huge/marathon game

This and time victory are reasons why I wasn't thinking about completing VVV while I actively played.

Anyway, good luck on your endeavor!

I've always really loved the marathon and huge games, it is just now its a bit of a drain on my CPU and a lot of twiddling my thumbs waiting on CS and barbs to finish their moves, especially once it gets to AD. I probably play too fast sometimes, but I can get through games especially if I have something I'm really interested in achieving. I wanted to go for QM in IV, but at that point in my life I really didn't have the time. I figure now that I'll just do a Large/Epic as my last game of the competition, and pretty much every other game is going to be on Standard/Standard except for the short games.

Now that I have so much free time and the game is final I wanted to get much more involved in the community and felt this was a great way to do it.

I've just got to figure out a system for what and how I'm going to share things in the thread, but I've got to wait for the first submission to be accepted before I go posting on it.

Thanks so much for the kind words of good luck!

 

[jayjackson]

Still waiting on the first submission, but the second one is going in today. Honestly, there isn't much to learn from it as I'm still learning all of the mechanics, especially endgame ones.

It also didn't help that my wife went to bed and I didn't go with her, so I'm sitting there tired trying to win in the Atomic Era. Did I nuke my second best city on accident trying to rebase a nuke not paying attention? You bet I did!

That probably added a couple of turns to the win, I'm guessing.

But Hiawatha and Arborea are now going to be submitted, with a 2006AD Science Victory!

 

[jayjackson]

Game #3 is now on the books!

We took Sejong of Korea to another science victory, our first victory on Emperor this version! It wasn't very fast, but I learned a lot more at Emperor than I did on the lower levels this time. The victory was a slow T348, but I'm able to see where I need to improve drastically.

Even though we were not declared on, I am surprised I was not. Askia and I shared my main border, and I was very aggressive with purchasing tiles early on. I knew he was the edge of my expansion, and I wanted absolutely every tile I could get my hands on before he took them. Luckily, he decided to take out Kamehameha, with Polynesia exiting the match in 780 AD.

I wound up conquering him late in the game, but I really could have done it much sooner had I tightened up my tech path a goodly bit. I also realize I made a mistake not getting Fertilizer much earlier than I did, and my cities were definitely not as tall as they could have been.

There was a lot more trade going on with the AI having their luxuries quicker, and there was a lot more gold in play, which was very pleasing to me. I'm just not at all satisfied with my finish times especially as I found Cerro de Potasi workable at first scout and was able to build Petra in the city.

Even though I'm a bit disappointed, there was a lot for me to feel good about on this run. I did manage a T93 National College and built Petra in Busan in T111. T125 Education and T155 Oxford. I know those are hardly earthshaking numbers with Korea, but they were definitely an improvement over my second game in this series.

We now have three submissions in, and once they are accepted I will be providing some screenshots from different saves and such, and as I said in a previous post, I have kept every single autosave and multiple other save positions for submissions, so if anyone is interested in that I will be more than willing to do that after the games are accepted to the Hall.

While this isn't your "normal" Let's Play or Story thread, I definitely do want to share much more once the submissions are in. Thanks for following along, 40 games to go!

EDIT: I want to play a more water-oriented map, but not prepared to play full Archipelago as I have a certain leader picked out for that and I'm more worried about attempting Immortal this game, so I am going to next do my Large Islands map with Elizabeth of England!

 

[jayjackson]

We've been dealt our first loss of the challenge, as I just couldn't get it done with Elizabeth on Large Islands on Immortal. I was pushing toward a domination victory, but ran into a monster army with Kamehameha. I've never been a big warmonger, so I made some large mistakes, but they will stand me in good stead for the future.

I'll definitely be playing a map with more land to try to get situated on Immortal, picking a huge naval map was probably a mistake at a new level, great naval civ or not.

I'm not sure which Civ or map script I'm going to use, but I think I should be OK on Immortal from here on, if I can cut out the mistakes. I may pick a top-tier civ on a Pangaea or something for the next map, just to try to get more acclimated on the level.

A loss was bound to happen, and I won't let it get me down. It isn't as if he beat me into submission, I just didn't see a path to victory, so I retired. Gives me more of today to get into the new save.

Thanks for following!

 

[jayjackson]

I was having trouble figuring out what game I wanted to play next as the Elizabeth game was a bit frustrating -- but I am wanting to challenge myself, so I've decided to keep it on Immortal, but instead of trying to go into the game with an idea how I'm going to win, I'm going to play Random Civ on Shuffle map. I need a Shuffle map for VVV as it is, and this will force me to play the map and my civ more than preconceived pregame notions.

So, as long as it isn't one of the civs I've already completed (chances are very low at this point) I'm going to just let the game decide my Civ and what kind of map it wants to give me. Even though we're allowed, I *NEVER* pick my opponents in my HoF games, it just feels gamey to me. So pretty much everything about this game is random.

Immortal, Standard/Standard -- we'll see what shakes out.

 

[jayjackson]

My first three games were accepted this evening, so I'll be posting some things tomorrow or the next day.

In other news, I finished my Immortal game this evening, so I'll be moving to Deity tomorrow afternoon, except for the games I need for VVV on a lower skill level. My wins haven't been fast yet, by any means -- but I knew I had the win in the bag for about the last 100 turns, so its definitely time to move on to the final skill level.

We'll see how long it takes me to join the "less than 2% of the Civ community who ever completes a game on Deity!" I'm very glad I was able to put Immortal in the book tonight, and I'll be updating all the posts in this thread in the morning as well to bring us up to date.

Glad I'll be able to post some strategy stuff from my saves now that they have been accepted! Thank you all for following along even though it hasn't been high-content so far as I wasn't writing up the saves, but everything will be improving on that front over the next few days!

See you tomorrow, and wish me luck on Deity! I am going to play Babylon for my first Deity game, I've been saving them as I feel they are my strongest Civ. Then, I'm going to play some warmonger type games, I really need to work on my military play -- and faster finishes in general!

Thanks again for following!