[IMM] Some Random Game Writeup [No Huts, No Random Events, large fractal]

[Manco Capac]

Are you still gonna go back and finish the first game? Otherwise all my genius advices from never playing this mod will be wasted!

I will, but the problem being it was played until a certain later point. Just until that point strategical comments can't change the game output. I did not expect someone would discuss about it. I expect initially no replies in this thread but perhaps a comment or two for the whole thread.

I wouldn't mind starting a game with people tagging along and saying their opinion what would be optimal, but that wasn't what I expected at first because on S&Tips=stock BTS and no mods attitude.

 

[Lone Wolf]

So, what is the point of that science capital penalty?

 

[Manco Capac]

Lol, I really don't know! It's somewhat ridiculous because side cities are potentially better than the capital in science until the right civic.

 

[Manco Capac]

Oh hey, lurkers, if there is any, nothing hold you back to encourage me.
No need to be a profound thought, just jest.

Not that I mind much I don't receive much comments. I got hardened minded since my passage to S&Tales.

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

Hey, Minos, what about peace? Why so annoyed?



Not gonna die.



Wheel is about to be researched and I strategically place my workers to be ready to road the war route.



Now, I'm going for the Agriculture route because both the wine and the wheat needs its respective improvement, being the winery and the farm.



And then pottery.



Let's pave my way to victory!







Well, peace is boring. Let's get some free snack out of these minoan paysants.





I think I am ready to take over the minoan capital.



Since I am at the limit of the happy cap, let's do a settler while rushing my neighbour.



Oh lookie. What a timing settler! Indeed, I don't want to kill my neighbour, just take its capital. Still, I will scare the settler to postpone a little the second city.






Let's march.






Minos seems to like tribal warriors over his UU.




Ok, I need the settler out and found that second city before I attack the capital. Peace.




I take peeks at the espionage field of production invested to keep track of his doings. Just to put all my chances towards a victorious rush.



Soon.



Just as planned!

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

Not sure I like this.

Time for some ego flattering. Good, I like what I see, but still compelled someone went into trouble to build a stronger army that early.



I want to discuss with you with my friend along, Annie the stake. Say hullo to Annie.



Per experience from stock BTS, the AI will settle the city even with foes around if next to it or right onto the founding spot. I DoWed now because I suspected the plain hill to be the spot and the culture would delay the war progression.




Seems pretty defenseless to my taste. The AI can't whip without Masonry, which is light years ahead of the present time.




Second city settled, now the capital is mine. What a second city I admit.



March.




Oh wait. Another unit dot in city?



Let's attack anyway. Oh great, he managed to sneak a javelineer in-between. Better than a minoan archer though.






Oh my! I'm out of units!



Oh yeah, the AI can't whip. So bam in your face.





Look at that sack gold and the quality of that city. Far better investment than a direct second city.





Let's complete the road between the two cities.



Ok, the unhappiness is what makes the city problematic. But still, I know over time, the holy site culture plus some buildings will eradicate the motherland unhappiness. Not to mention war makes it more pronounced.



Since I was one turn away from Mysticism, I saw no objection to finish it to give Stonehenge a shot. If I get it, it's a free +2 culture obelisk in every city, which is a better deal than the base game given the nerfs made in this mod.



Then I return to the Agriculture path.



Pastoralism is such a useless tech.




8 turns to go. Thanks to sack gold.



Let's bring back my army of workers.

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

About T57, I felt the Stonehenge was starting to be a risky wonder. No backup to what I said, but getting it was necessarily a buff given it only cost 150 hammers vs the 200 hammers a settler cost.



Again, since I want to see his second city develops peacefully, I make a ceasefire.



It was time I convert to Animism to alleviate the terrible anger level my newly captured city.



At the same time, Phaistos also got a lucky spread.



Finally, I can farm stuff and finish quickly that settler once the hammers start decaying, that is in 10 turns.



Pottery is a pre-requisite to many good techs and I need to start laying down some cottages to be capable to keep going technologically along the mysterious unknown AI's.



Sadly, the workers aren't in place yet.





It is true the city is costly at first, but it is gonna a great deal in my economy later. And since I don't kill Minos, earlier the capture, easier the progressive culture conversion of the population.

Let's hope he redirects his attentions on peaceful builds.




A trick to be known is when I am training either a worker or a settler, the angry citizens don't eat food, meaning I am winning in this situation. A settler then.



Good to see it's starting to convert to my culture already.


Good, first grain resource.



Now, while microing a tad, I will improve that wine for more happiness.



Let's cross fingers I get the Stonehenge.




I see Minos really haven't learnt his lesson.





Pottery in. Now real stuff is starting. I choose Burial Grounds tech. It gives me another religion (thus a semi-blockade) and access to the Mids. Since there is no other AI around, going for the peaceful religious route is best early game. Masonry is simply not pressing stuff.



Wine in. More cottages needed.




Glad to see Knossos is no longer angry. I lay down more cottages. Expanding is not an issue right now. Teching is the one.




Peace, Minos.



Knossos is a pretty good city once the angry citizens are no more.



I agree on you Minos in preparing another worker for me.



Since I'm gunning for the Mids, I start moving one of my strong javelineers around the cow-stone site with plenty of river tiles. I want to settle that place.



Burial Grounds in 9 turns. Not bad. I have a decent chance. Moar cottages. Overexpanding won't help.

 

[soundjata]

Oh hey, lurkers, if there is any, nothing hold you back to encourage me.

Spoiler :

Cheers Tachy! You are the spice, without which CFC would be tasteless

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

The settler is out.



Need to clean the region before settling. I see a barb city around.



15% Carthaginians already. Nice. With the free Obelisk from Stonehenge, that's gonna accelerate.



It's sad to abuse the AI that way, but sometimes it is needed to give a reasonable shot to a game, especially a cultural game.




Oh gawd, please, have mercy.



Excellent! The city site is safe and the workers ready to farm those grass cows and cottage those grass river tiles.



More cottages in Knossos.



Kinda repetitive, eh?



Stupid tribal warrior has no chance to vanquish my fully healed javelineer.



Utica, second founded city. T81. Seems late, but a kind reminder this is not base BTS.







Looks like Stonehenge is mine.




Looks like weird, but I also cottage those cows. Without Masonry and the need for expansion, I don't see the point of more food.




Building Caravans allowed me to lower a tad the maintenance and speed up the next border pop. Better to scare away those barb units.



Burial Grounds is mine. Heliopolitan Gods religion isn't founded yet. Pretty awesome. But I lack gold. So one more turn.



The religion is mine.



Let's have a view into the demographics. Pretty good. For now.



Along Burial Grounds come the Bronze Age.





Since I'm gunning for a cultural victory and culture modifiers are also pretty rare, I want to give a shot to the Oracle of Dodona. Another strong motivation is the multiple happiness boosts coming along that tech. One in the form of a building and the other of a civic that affects the granaries.



Utica received the religion. I also see our best friend tagging along the barbs.



With Nature Cult allowing the Cult of Nature civic (Religious block), the granary I am building will give one more happy face, thus a reason to grow to the next pop. It also gives +1 health.



Hmmm...Phaistos just got its border pop and stole a couple of crucial tiles. That was expected.

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

Many mechanisms have evolved since Vanilla Civ4 and one of them is the processing of hammers into either research, gold or culture. Back to the days, it was 50% of hammers into the process and it could be affected by the respective commerce multipliers like a library would affect the process output just like the forge does it now directly on hammers.
In TAM, since it's an exportation of a Vanilla mod, the same 50% processing still appears. That means fail gold with a rate of one hammer to one gold is efficient compared to outright building wealth.

Knossos will start the Mids for some low tier fail gold while waiting for the stone to be connected.




Nature Cult tech gives access to the religious civic Cult of Nature, which allows Granary to +1 happy/health and another generic 10% modifier on units.



Well, Minos sure is a believer.



Here's a comparison of our powers.



And the place I occupy in the world.



Animism has spread to Utica.



But the Mids project is suspended temporarily for a granary and thus a higher happy cap.



And here starts the barbarian invasions. First enemy, a 2 strength archer. Let's move to that hill and I shall have decent chance to win.



Well, no.




Looks like Minos is working on something big. Possibly another settler, which makes Phaistos a target now.



Nature Cult in. Time to grow more with the Holy Site building and the super granary. Oracle of Dodona a priority. I target culture as I said.



Since I have the monopoly on Burial Grounds tech, I take my chances on Polytheism and get another religion. Anyways, Writing will allow me to extort techs from Minos.



And a pleasant sight offered to my eyes and that is a unscratched archer that killed my warrior at 33% of winning. Nice.



I swap to Cult of Nature.



I see the minoan tribal warrior has problems dealing with incoming barbs. Do you job, I'm not complaining. Anyways, the pre-BTS IMM AI has even better handicaps against barbs.



Now, I bring a stronger tribal warrior hidden in a forest. Not gonna work puny archer!



I build another tribal warrior just in case because they may have more barbs out there.



You gotta be kidding me! It's not a human, but Enkidu himself!



The hell with the odds. Probably got a promo out of the last battle he got unharmed.



Now, out of improvements, I road everything...literally.



OH SHI- They're coming.




That infernal archer sure is a problem.



Now, past a river and camouflaged under trees, the wounded archer can't win, right!?



My sanity is preserved!



Pif paf puf.



Looks like going for Polytheism was a bad choice after all. You can't get everything.



Then I got for copper working, enabling the quarry improvement.

 

[soundjata]

Pif paf puf.

Best quote so far

 

[Mitchum]

I'm impressed that you're able to keep all of this new stuff straight when playing a new mod? It's funny how you say you're bored with "generic" BtS because it gets old. Well I must be an old dawg because my head spins just looking at screenshots showing things I don't know (strange resources, new techs, different tech tree, etc.). I guess the fear of the unknown is what keeps me from trying new mods. Heck, I was "afraid" to play Warlords and BtS for a long time and stuck to Vanilla because I didn't want to have to figure out unique buildings, great generals, espionage, corporations, etc. Call me a wimp... or lazy!

 

[RagingHordes]

It's cool. We like Civ because we like to explore the interactions. Once you learn all of them, you might as well move on. Otherwise we're playing automatically, from instinct, and there is almost no discovery.
I love this thread, keep posting Tachy!

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

Dawn of the next hundred turns, a certain Plutarchos claimed we were the most cultured. Not surprising since we are focusing on culture.



Finally, the last barb warrior was about to wipe himself out.



Still, although being the most culture, something struck me as weird being this Top 5 of cities. Wow, someone managed to get more culture than my capital. I guess there is another cultural civ around.



Now, the big problem with the Oracle of Dodona is being an even more riskier wonder than the Stonehenge. SH is rather cheap and we are more leaned to start it rather early, but the Oracle of Dodona has a rather steep price of 250 hammers for the few it gives. 25% culture, +2 culture rate and +1 GPP is weak compared to the SH attibutes. Only situation where it is valuable is having some incense around speeding the wonder at 100%, but that is also the problem of its risky enterprise. Incense is more likely to be connected that early than stone needing Copper Working. Basically because the Incense is enabled with the same tech being Nature Cult. Stonehenge enabling route is different than the quarry enabling tech.




I am ready to improve the stone.




Oh hey! Copper. Now, you may think, it is the future ability to make heavier type of metal units, but that is not reality on TAM. For mounted units, you need horses, but metal units are always available with the right tech. I guess it is to give a chance to everyone. In fact, copper doesn't enable axemen, spearmen, etc. but enables working on better weapons and it is shown as a free promotion. If you got a smithy in a certain city, just make your units pass by there and they'll get basically a combat-like promo (but doesn't replace) according to the level of metal. IIRC, it's 10% for copper, 15% for Tin, 20% for Iron and at last 30% for Steel and that is not cumulative, but replace one by a superior one.



Could it be that Minos want badly that barb city or protect me from them.



Two more turns and fast Mids is mine.



Since the Oracle of Dodono is pretty nice for culture and also risky, I attempt to rush it with forest chops.



Oh! They love me. Ok, it's a pleasure to be regent.



Fail gold!




Awww....



Ok, no more Mids in Knossos and changed to Holy Site for further growth.



6 turns Mids. Nice.




Still, you may think the hammer investment in the Oracle of Dodona is wasted, but the reality is not. Since Wealth build only convert half my hammers into gold, every hammer in wonders has double efficiency compared to pure wealth action. Thus attempting wonders is never bad unless you sacrifice huge swathes of good lands for it and even there, you may just conquer it later. So starting wonders=good.



You could see that chops are inefficient for the number of worker turns. But at this point, I have plenty of idle workers for that job. Indeed and sadly, TAM doesn't have anywhere some boost on chops. Dunno why but I suspect a bad adjustment.





For the moment being, I start a settler in Knossos while waiting the return of the workers for laying down some cottages.



So near.



With Fruit resource being under a forest, I had to wait until Copper Working before being capable to improve it.



Yay! Free GAge.




See that free engineer specialist. Go tell me it's not powerful. A specialist that gives +1 food, +2 hammers and +2 GPP, meaning almost a self-sustainable specialist. And on top of those output can happen a right civic for +1 science or +1 gold.



Oh hey, this is my GP bar.

 

[kossin]

Encouragement skill has increased by 1.

I'm impressed that you're able to keep all of this new stuff straight when playing a new mod? It's funny how you say you're bored with "generic" BtS because it gets old. Well I must be an old dawg because my head spins just looking at screenshots showing things I don't know (strange resources, new techs, different tech tree, etc.). I guess the fear of the unknown is what keeps me from trying new mods. Heck, I was "afraid" to play Warlords and BtS for a long time and stuck to Vanilla because I didn't want to have to figure out unique buildings, great generals, espionage, corporations, etc. Call me a wimp... or lazy!

I also take a glance but there's so much new stuff that it's too hard to comment without going in game and looking at what does what and eventually try out the new mechanics.

It's a bit like trying out a new software without instruction manual to me.

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

I didn't mention it, but right after Copper Working, I went right after for Astrology, a tech that simply enables the wonder Sphinx. What for? Although a pretty meager gift for a tech, it's the MOST powerful wonder and one reason I often try to get Heliopolitan Gods to somehow blockade that wonder for fair chances to get it.
Basically the Sphinx is what the Mids used to be in BTS, that is enabling all Government civics. And I mentioned somewhere earlier one weakness of this mod is the civic gets better as it is enabled later. Especially for Government, Legal, Labor and Military sections. The only section where it depends of the situation is the Religious one although some choices are better than others. Now figure the thing out: you start with +50% maintenance for city distance and the earliest upgrade with Despotism tech is now +25% maintenance for city distance. With the latest enabled by the Sphinx, it's the empire civic, thus a bunch of "collateral" bonuses along the most powerful being -25% on city maintenance. This is almost brokenly good. Basically gives an economic equalizer to high level AI's with their high maintenance discounts. Also the Sphinx is soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo abusively cheap. The normal BTS Mids cost a whooping 500 hammers while the Sphinx only cost 150 hammers for better civics!

Now, I started a Burial Mound to one hammer until completion. Without Masonry, that is the sole way to put max OF hammers into the Sphinx.




Astrology.




Since I've got many mining resources, I felt it was time to get the right tech for mining my metal resources.



3 turns Sphinx. Most perfect.



Oh sorry, 1 turn Sphinx thanks to chops. ;3



Excellent, Minos really was training another settler. Time to move an army towards Phaistos, another excellent city site if not the best of the region.





What am I going to get?



Time to train an army for Phaistos.



Empire civic is just like too powerful.




Even with Medium civic cost, I saved 4 gpt per turn.



Uh. A GProphet...than can't bulb anything. Wut? Now I'm curious how the bulbing order works in TAM.



It was a long thought and I deemed settling was best.



My culture rate. Seems low? On TAM, it's extremely heavy culture rate that early.



Javelineers.



Oh? Javelineers invasion.




Zakros, the new Minoan city.

This is no good news because Composite Archers are the regular archers. Looks like Minos has finally learnt!



Mining tech.



A little nomenclature problem in this mod is dense forest are at several places still called jungle feature. Anyways, if you got to start in dense forest starts just like my Tartessos game, see how far I need to tech to get rid of them.



Defense!



Wow! Another bad luck. At least, javelineers can't win a battle in the strict sense.



Going to fill several ancient techs for a grander goal, i.e. beeline.




The barbs are getting a little out of control.

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

Ummm. The barbs are getting a little out of control.




I know this has no urgence, but my workers are again starting to idle around.



Lol, invading with tribal warriors. Of course, what will hurt those archers are the javelineers, which I recall you is the former of catapults.



Looks good regarding the barbarian front.



Ugh...




The elder council is an interesting building. It takes basically 30 turns to recover from its investment. So, it's a good building.



Wondering what was going on around that barb city and I got my strong surprise. Wow.



Get away from me, bloodlust javelineer.



Writing tech in. Reveals Papyrus resource and the tech trading.



And now I show my beeline. Heroism. It's basically one route towards wonders and culture...if not the route. I want the Oracle mine.



Wow. I got Papyrus. It's a nice resource that can only be found on flood plains. Use? It's a resource multiplier for certain wonders like the Hanging Gardens and the infamous GLib of Alexandria.



Finished mining my gold tile. What for? Happy cap raised.




Despotism tech in. That tech is odd because we can't trade it whatsoever.



I got a health problem. The cheap 30 hammers well will resolve it. Well is enabled by Mining...looks logical since it needs ground drilling.



Now I give up to the cottage for the superior in output Papyrus.



Pretty awesome to be second in GNP. Of course, that doesn't mean literally only commerce or science in the strict sense. Reminder that I'm first for culture overall and that's the main reason of being second. That means some hidden AI is enormous economically.



Out of necessary building, I build the suboptimal Caravans that give 20% gold and 25% culture.



Zakros got Animism.



Let's compare our technological advances.



Ok, time to rush!

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

We took a peek and saw Phaistos was guarded by 3 minoan composite archers, one of them being a hero. A hero is simply a cheaper version of the unit with several special promotions like Leadership.



I was attacking from two fronts.



It was pleasing sight to see he didn't start anything.



Ouch! Thanks to those minoan archer having earch 1-4 first strike, it was a massacre of my army. I don't think I'll be able to get anything as tribute. And I was just right in unit number. Last one for the last wounded defender.





Utica being not riverside, it started to be hit by unhealthiness, thus I started a mound burial. And later a well.




Of course, the barbs took their chance to make a backdoor attack. Not a chance.




Alphabet was in along the weak library and the nice spy unit.



Now, I promised the Minoans a long long peace. Since completely surrounded by my culture, it was obvious he couldn't expand anymore. Also, I don't want to kill him for my future culture plans.




While maneuvering the caravans, I got a 2 turns cultural expansion.



Mwuahahaha. First for GNP.



And with Phaistos' enormous potential in commerce, that will rise even more. It even has its own gold mine.



You can compare the papyrus to a normal cottage tile and see how superior it is compared to it.



Dynasticism tech in. Off to Heroism.



Barbs.




In 8 turns, I will receive either a 66% GEngineer or a 33% GProphet.



As you can see, the library isn't such a great building. It only gives +2 beakers +2 culture. Ignoring the culture aspect not being always useful, that is 80 hammers/2 beakers=40 turns before investment returned. That is more than the tribal council building of 30 hammers.



Moar barbs.



I am starting to cottage the western flank of Phaistos.



Leave me alone!




Damn...!




And this leaves to a presentation of the Oracle of Delphi. The typical free tech along a miscellanous bonus being +1 happy. Sadly, it gives pathetic rates of GPP and culture. And the cost is higher than the base BTS by 50 hammers. And marble is only revealed with Masonry tech, which means a different path. Thus I have to start the wonder before getting the multiplier.

 

[Manco Capac]

Spoiler :

Heroism is teched and Olympian Gods religion has been founded in Carthaginian empire.



Now off to Masonry to reveal some nearby marble. And better anti-barb unit.



No time to lose, I start the wonder to get a faster tech pace.



Man, not another GProphet. At 33% to add more salt into wound.



Olympian Gods religion was founded in Knossos and now has already spreaded to Phaistos. Indeed, higher level is the religion, bigger spread RNG it has. It was a mean to equalize the religions and somehow arranged the typical problem that early religion tends to dominate the whole world in no time.



I see my GProphet can build a shrine. But I need a tech for it.



I see the Tower of Babel is constructed somewhere.



Now, for the sake of that juicy free GEngineer, I beeline towards Geometry to get it.



The reason of this beeline being able to oracle Architecture, which has more wonders to build.



Here's the minoan empire in the present days. In a prison.



See that? Only 22 of culture rate. In normal BTS, it would be so easy to break the hundred by that time.



Thanks tipsy Dionysus, but I already did know this.



Seeing Knossos has hit its happy ceiling, I start some settler to stunt the growth. I'm basically in isolation now. So work the hell of those cottages.



Since Alphabet, I trained a spy to start stealing techs from Minos.



More barbs.



And already I lost my prime place in GNP. Seriously!



Normally, we wait mathematics for chopping some forests. But as you can see, for some reason, the chop boost was taken and remains the ability to build useless forts and some aqueduc. The aqueduc is interesting for being the very first building that allows one specialist. The engineer.



Olympian Gods in Zakros.



I have -50% for idle spy. At some point, I'll even change of state religion to get full -40% discount instead of just -15%.



Time to fill the early tech tree.





See that amount of commerce and I'm second in GNP. It's insane.



Geometry tech. I was first and I got my free GEngineer.




Now I backtracked to Masonry and will get Urbanization tech, the last pre-requisite to Architecture.



Oh barbs <3




Marble marble! Also, some guy got some babylonian shrine built. Interesting.



Did I say MARBLE!?

 

[Lone Wolf]

-24 for "you declared war on us"? Minos is definitely a fellow to hold grudges.