Immortal Egypt Wonder Challenge Let's Play (of an amateur)

[amateurgamer88]

Hi everyone! I'm amateurgamer88. I'm returning to Immortal difficulty to tackle this challenge because I'm still too inexperienced for Deity. My last game as Denmark, as shown in my photojournal, is filled with lots of wars and went from a photojournal to a let's play. As the title suggests, I am going to play as Egypt with a Wonder Challenge. Do note that this is my first time playing this civ on VP so it should be interesting. What's the Wonder Challenge? I'll explain it in the rules.

I know I'm not a great player so I appreciate any advice as I want to learn more. I have many areas lacking so feel free to point them out to me. I like to improve more as I actually want to eventually win some deity matches. As a result, I'm doing these photojournals so people can see what I'm doing wrong and give me constructive criticism.

An additional note is that, due to various reasons, I have to play this game windowed so, in later eras, you'll see the various things like gold, resources and etc overlapping. I also have to lower my graphic setting so my game can run smoother. I apologize for that but it's the limitations I work with.

Spoiler Game Settings :

Immortal (7) Difficulty
Epic Speed
Standard Size, 10 civs, 20 city states
Frontier (Large Continents)
Low Sea Level
Strategic Balance
No events, vassalage, ancient ruins, tech brokering and tech trading
Allow Policy Saving (Hope this delays an Ideology but who knows)
New Random Seed
Disable Nuclear Weapons
No Spain, Byzantium and Morocco (due to them showing up too often in my past games)

The Patch used in this game is still 10-10. I'll move to a newer version once I finish my marathon games. That's why this game is in Epic pace.

Spoiler Rule(s) :

For the Wonder challenge, my goal is to get all the World Wonders whether by building them or conquering them from a civ that built them. When I say all the World Wonders, I also include those accessible by completing a Policy tree, the Ideology ones and the WC ones. This should be quite interesting as I don't know if it's doable or not.

I think that this is only a challenge if I can get all these Wonders before anyone gets a victory. That means that I can't let AI get a victory so it's going to be an interesting balancing act. I can't let AIs get too ahead but I can't hurt them so much that they can't build the Wonders for me.

I will have one instance of save scumming available to me. I can only use it to ensure that all three ideologies are picked in the game so I can get all three Ideology Wonders. For example, a civ picked its ideology. If another civ picks a different one before I get mine, then I don't need to use it. Otherwise, I'm hoping Random Seed will make that civ pick a different one to ensure we don't have all civs picking one or two of the ideologies.

If this challenge proves too easy with Egypt, I might try a different civ. However, I usually play Marathon so the Epic speed might throw me off quite a bit. We'll see how I adjust to that.

Spoiler Initial Thoughts on the Civilization :

Monument Builders:
There are three aspects to this UA. First, it helps you build Wonders faster which's quite massive. Secondly, you have a choice between Artifacts and Landmarks depending on what yields you want more. The faster Wonder build time can be massive but we'll see how that will go in this game. Overall, the UA is very straightforward where one is critical early in the game while the latter starts to shine later in the game. It feels like Artistry might be quite important for those hidden Antiquity Sites but we'll see. I can't complete all the trees.

Burial Tomb:
This UB replaces the Caravansary and it seems alright. Getting an artifact early on can be quite massive with those yields, especially when you access the building in the Classical Era. You need to work one less Tundra/Desert tile to get the extra food and good. I honestly don't know how strong this really is because those two tiles are generally weak overall. You actually get one less gold for TR so that's a bit of a nerf. The faith yield might be alright as it times nicely with when the religions require faith. However, I definitely won't be focusing on this UB for its faith. Overall, I can see potential for this UB but we'll see how I take advantage of it.

War Chariot:
The War Chariot doesn't require horse so that's good as the Wheel doesn't reveal horses. The fact that this unit still uses up all of its movements in rough terrain makes it a bit painful to use. Defensively, this unit can be amazing. Offensive, you need some luck with the terrains. Overall, I'm not too keen of this unit. However, I do admit that its promotion, Gift of the Pharaoh, can really help you early on when dealing with barbarians. Unless I read the information about this promotion wrong, it doesn't seem to vanish upon promotions. Maybe I will change my mind once I try this UU out. I remember fighting against them with Aztecs and it was tough if I didn't use the rough terrains.

 

[amateurgamer88]

Chapter 1

 

[amateurgamer88]

I made a huge mistake in the settings so a new game is started here. I do explain what the mess up is as it's just something that stacks the odds greatly against me.

Chapter 2

 

[amateurgamer88]

We continue as I rant about how bad I am about this speed. Don't watch if you hate rants.

Chapter 3

 

[chicorbeef]

All the wonders? ...Does that mean the game will be a domination one

I wonder why you rushed Drama/Poetry and not Currency...Currency is like the quintessential tech I rush as Egypt, especially when you have so many cities, Burial Tombs carry my Classical/Medieval Era so I want them ASAP...and you can dot Villages along those long roads. I also would have rushed Hanging Gardens probably. Getting +8 Culture/+5 Science per city is no joke.

Opening Authority with no neighbours is a questionable decision, but you realized that lol.

Although you're kind of behind now I think with that much land and literally no competition you can leverage a Progress game well.

I don't like building Roads on resource tiles because that means no villages.

Off-topic, but you're playing a lot of civ...how do you manage having 4 different games running at the same time?

 

[amateurgamer88]

All the wonders? ...Does that mean the game will be a domination one

I wonder why you rushed Drama/Poetry and not Currency...Currency is like the quintessential tech I rush as Egypt, especially when you have so many cities, Burial Tombs carry my Classical/Medieval Era so I want them ASAP...and you can dot Villages along those long roads. I also would have rushed Hanging Gardens probably. Getting +8 Culture/+5 Science per city is no joke.

Opening Authority with no neighbours is a questionable decision, but you realized that lol.

Although you're kind of behind now I think with that much land and literally no competition you can leverage a Progress game well.

I don't like building Roads on resource tiles because that means no villages.

Off-topic, but you're playing a lot of civ...how do you manage having 4 different games running at the same time?

Well, this can only be done with domination. However, it requires better timing than what I'm capable of now. Let's just say that Epic Speed can be quite hard for me to adjust at the moment. I do think Marathon Speed is easier than both Epic and Standard speed after my few games.

I rushed Drama/Poetry because I was an idiot. I play very sloppily and now you can see it. I have much to improve before I can tackle anything other than Marathon games. I realize now my mistakes and am changing. However, I'm a slow learner so that might take some time.

I do stupid things with policies. However, I believe that I opened with Authority because I wanted to stand a better chance against numerous barbarians due to my isolation with the extra combat strength. It's not exactly helpful if I keep getting raided by barbarians because I couldn't do much to them. I'm curious what you would've done. If you are getting swamped by barbs, would you still go Progress and what build order would you go?

I might be able to leverage a Progress game well but I feel like I'm at a loss how to handle this speed. Everything feels so different and wars require a different thinking. On Marathon, you literally do get more time to strategize and plan your attacks. On Epic and Standard, I feel like you have to be more decisive and require a different bit of thinking. I also don't find myself falling that behind on Marathon either.

Well, I am on holiday so I do have a lot more time. Once school and work starts again, I'll be back slow updates. I don't know how things will go but I'll probably only have a photojournal and a YouTube series going (2 games going). We'll see...

 

[chicorbeef]

I think it's really hard for a barb swamp to truly mess up your game. Losing 11 Science isn't the end of the world. As for what I would have done? Well, I only invest in wonders when after investment I can complete them in one turn (to lower chances of it getting stolen after I invest in it) so I might have just bought a Warrior with that money you invested in Stonehenge-you most likely would have gotten Stonehenge anyway thanks to Egypt's bonus.

By the way, you put a few turns into a Shrine...why not just work Farming for a bit there to prepare your city for Stonehenge? Then work the Hill with your third citizen. That would improve the odds of getting Stonehenge.

On a similar note, why bother with a Shrine when you can kick out a Settler and settle Kailash sooner?

On a side note, I don't think you're a bad player at all, honestly, as I saw in your photojournals that you were quite capable. I make plenty of dumb errors in my games, I think most players do. I don't want to come off as too harsh when I'm really not that excellent of a player myself.

 

[Minh Le]

We all make mistake. I call that trials and errors. Its good that people can point out our mistakes so we can improve in the next try

 

[amateurgamer88]

I think it's really hard for a barb swamp to truly mess up your game. Losing 11 Science isn't the end of the world. As for what I would have done? Well, I only invest in wonders when after investment I can complete them in one turn (to lower chances of it getting stolen after I invest in it) so I might have just bought a Warrior with that money you invested in Stonehenge-you most likely would have gotten Stonehenge anyway thanks to Egypt's bonus.

By the way, you put a few turns into a Shrine...why not just work Farming for a bit there to prepare your city for Stonehenge? Then work the Hill with your third citizen. That would improve the odds of getting Stonehenge.

On a similar note, why bother with a Shrine when you can kick out a Settler and settle Kailash sooner?

On a side note, I don't think you're a bad player at all, honestly, as I saw in your photojournals that you were quite capable. I make plenty of dumb errors in my games, I think most players do. I don't want to come off as too harsh when I'm really not that excellent of a player myself.

With Egypt's bonus, I wasn't sure how strong it would've been. I should definitely minimize my odds of losing Wonders by playing better but I can do lots of dumb things often. Regarding why I didn't work Farming, it's one of those things that didn't occur to me. I'm terrible at micromanaging unless it's deploy units for war in Marathon Speed. I'll keep that in mind for a future game. Regarding the Settler, I don't know what I was thinking. I did warn that my gameplay will be miserable to watch.

Nah, you can just point out my mistakes and I'll do my best to fix them. I know I make mistakes or I'd be able to handle higher difficulties on Standard. It's weird but I do feel like slower speeds are easier than Standard Speed. It's just such a different playstyle and my mistake ridden style isn't well suited. Maybe in the distant future, you'll see a flawless game from me. Until then, this is what you'll get. A lot of facepalm moments and such. xD

We all make mistake. I call that trials and errors. Its good that people can point out our mistakes so we can improve in the next try

Haha, I'm a slow learner so we'll see how I fare. I think most people probably have given up watching me. They want to see someone who can teach them what to do. I'm sure nobody needs help learning what not to do. I should just name my series that. What not to do on Civ 5 VP by amateur

 

[amateurgamer88]

Chapter 4

 

[amateurgamer88]

Chapter 5

 

[amateurgamer88]

This is sadly the last playthrough. I realize that I'm not ready for the challenge yet. I need to play more Epic speed games to learn how to play at this speed.

Chapter 6