[BTS] Immortal fun Isabella map w/writeup

[jnebbe]

Hi, just finished a match on a pretty fun map I wanted to share, wanted to see how others would play, also I think just the process of making a writeup will help me improve.
Despite the great start it was still pretty tricky for me.

Normal size+speed
Fractal, not iso
No huts/random events

Attaching T0 save.

Start

Spoiler :

Writeup (with major spoilers ofc)

Spoiler :

Settled on marble before even moving warrior



Recognized right away that commerce would be biggest issue with so much food and forests

I believe tech path was agri->wheel->pottery->mining->bw->poly->masonry->ah->writing->math->aesthetics->lit





I put nearly all chops into ToA once I got masonry+poly





I went towards aesthetics since some cities were starting to get close to finishing ToA and then I could work on parthenon as well. And at that point I may as well get great library as well





Freddy and Justin are expanding lightning fast





ToA finally finished by ai, I beeline masonry+hbr for an elepult attack. Perhaps a too late, I feel like I was waiting on ToA to finish forever.





Churn out an army for either justin or freddy. Justin's GLH was tantalizingly close in the bottom-left corner but he got longbows very quickly after oracle-ing monarchy I settled on attacking freddy

In hindsight this was probably the freest GLH build of my life followed by probably a HA attack on justin.





Attack was very successful, captured 5 cities in 13 turns





Justin attacks freddy as well. He has another stack about 2/3 this size and runs over freddy. I have to bribe him out of war a couple times.





I'm furthest ahead in tech but justin's not far behind since he has everything I need and I keep gifting him things to get him out of war.
Madrid has been churning out scientists from great library+national epic. I have 3 which I've been saving, I'm able to bulb philo, bulb printing press, trade for engineering, partial bulb on chemistry, and finally liberalism steel.

Justin parked his stack right outside his borders so I wanted to blast it all with cannons.

After getting steel justin trades me 1600 gold for something which is about halfway to sci-method+communism.





Freddy is killed off so the only one who doesn't like justin is washington across the ocean






I have to settle this piss poor city in the north just for iron since justin wants 170gp/t for it, but....





Madrid generates a 7% GA and using it there lets me attack justin's stack immediately!

Unfortunately I just didn't have enough rifles (wanted to attack asap since justin was close to rifling himself), an untimely dow from kublai, and shaka being bribed into war by justin, there's no way I was going to win this.


No strategic resources in my land besides horse and not a lot of luxuries so I struggled with happiness a lot. Could've done a lot different, could've built GLH->HA attack, maybe settle the unclaimed islands early since I was first to astronomy, maybe kill off kublai/washington early, maybe wait until state property and attack justin with tanks?
ggs good learning experience

 

[krikav]

Sorry, checked your writeup but might give the map a try with some slight map knowledge anyway.
From what I see, your initial play where good, rapid expansion and failgolding. Things where shaping up to a HoF run.
I'm not too sure about pottery before BW, I think you could have expanded abit faster and then done a worker burst and cottage recovery later.
You should have expanded toward the AI first I think, there was a wet corn in the west too...

Too late? It's almost never too late with enough catapults and jumbos.

Staring at that last screenshot I see that Justinian is pleased with you, he doesn't plot at pleased and I think it would have been wiser to swap targets there.
I realize that you feel that he is your main competitor and that you have to deal with him, but the timing was probably off.
I'm not sure bribing him out of the war contantly was good, depends really.

Overall, I think you should have utilized the awesome trait SPI more here. Not sure how diplo got messed up with Kublai/Washington.

Nice with that GArtist and resource city!

 

[krikav]

Spoiler T53 :

Lake is really nice this early.

Still working max food at pop4, want to whip a settler at bw.

Spi swap to slavery and whip right away.

With myst leaders, chopping into SH can be very good economically early on.

That is, if the AIs are not asleep at the wheel and don't build SH.
But still, even with gross disregard for economy (did not connect cities), I got to pottery anyway.
Expansion could be faster too if not chopping into SH, but better safe than sorry.
With some luck, Seville should get buddhism fast (so close to holy city), but if not perhaps gifting Justinian a city could be an idea to have a more relaxed game.

 

[krikav]

@jnebbe

"Despite the great start it was still pretty tricky for me."
I think you held back your expansion and emphazised economy at times when you should have put focus on production.

I would practice the opening and compare abit if I where you.
I did a playthrough and tried to put checkpoints where you had your screenshots.

I think you are abit afraid to tank your economy? Really, as long as you can reach pottery, almost no REX is too much, and especially here where you got myst and can chop/build into SH abit.
Also think you should be abit more bold early on, stake out more than your fair share of the land if you can.

Spoiler T84 :

The AIs took forever to build SH for me too, but once they did I had almost enough to get through AH->Writing->Poly->Mason, then I snailed my way to priesthood for the 40H temples. Figured I could whip a few and get nice OF into ToAR, and opening up for a monarchy trade seems good.

 

[krikav]

And other:
This is for sure a fun map!
Marble available and reasonable access to horses, a conquistadorstomp should be really strong here.

The original save is w/o mods, and has vassal states turned off (no fan of that).
I did a wb-save to play on buffy, but forgot to save my T0 save with barb techs for you.

 

[jnebbe]

Ty for advice

@jnebbe
I think you are abit afraid to tank your economy? Really, as long as you can reach pottery, almost no REX is too much, and especially here where you got myst and can chop/build into SH abit.
Also think you should be abit more bold early on, stake out more than your fair share of the land if you can.

Probably, I figured it was pointless to expand north into all the jungle as it would take so long for it to pay off.
I suppose if your diplo is fine you shouldn't be afraid of an attack and can afford to tank your economy

I'm really curious on your city order. We settled in mostly the same spots but you immediately settled more towards justin and it let you get more land than I did. In particular I didn't even have the southern fish in my bfc since I settled that so late I figured I wouldn't keep that tile for long.

 

[krikav]

If you can, then settling toward the AIs are almost always a priority. That secures more land for you and less for them.
If you push against Justinian, he will push against some other AI on his other side.
You can settle your "backfill" later.
Securing land is often so important, that it is worth it to settle spots that are objectivly on their own worse first, if there is compeition for them.

This is even more the case on deity, where they get an extra settler. Where you place your second city is extra important because it's rare to have time to get the third settler out, before the AI causally plops down city#4 and #5. :|

The exception ofcourse, is the psycopaths. You really don't want to push borders with Shaka/Monty early on.
If there had been some food in the region by Justinians Gold I would have gone there too, it was unclaimed for quite some time. But with no food, I didn't think it was worth it.

Oh, and good thing you didn't go for the jungle. That rice spot is as far as I would go too, Fredrich/Justinian can clear that area while we build units.

 

[floydmcw]

Played 55 turns ...

Spoiler The opening :

SIP. Built a settler for desert near fish. But when I found Justy's borders I changed my mind and settled wet corn/jumbos to block him.

Founded the fish spot on T46. T49 got 30 overflow from a worker whip, could have built 2 warriors with it but decided to put it into Stonehenge "like the good players on CivFanatics do". Also, using the OF for warriors would have wasted 6 hammers!

On the VERY NEXT TURN a barb archer appeared, killed a warrior in forest without losing any HP, and burned Seville on the next turn.

So I wasted 100 hammers not 6.

In spite of that I like the position, will get ~70 gold from SH when it completes and I've already refounded Seville.

Tech path was Ag -> Mining -> BW -> TW -> Pottery -> Hunting, AH next.

 

[krikav]

@floydmcw

Spoiler :

Rolling 36 hammers into a warrior is for sure annoying, but when the situation calls for it... well have to do what you have to do.
But it sounds like you didn't get any warning, and not much to do then.
I try to keep at least 2 units at least close by a newly settled village, sometimes real nastiness happends and a evil spear comes from nowhere, having a warrior or preferably a scout that can lure the barb in the other direction saves so much valuable time.

Losing the second city can sometimes be a devastating blow, and most games where I experience that I just ragequit.
But BOTM 162 has a special place in my heart precisely because I did go out on a limb and gamble abit, then lost second city to barbs but did eventually recover.

 

[floydmcw]

Spoiler :

@floydmcw
Rolling 36 hammers into a warrior is for sure annoying, but when the situation calls for it... well have to do what you have to do.
But it sounds like you didn't get any warning, and not much to do then.

I was lulled into a false sense of security by seeing only one barb, a warrior, until that point.

Losing the second city can sometimes be a devastating blow, and most games where I experience that I just ragequit.
But BOTM 162 has a special place in my heart precisely because I did go out on a limb and gamble abit, then lost second city to barbs but did eventually recover.

It was actually my third city and hadn't done much other than almost finish a WB.

Think I'm still in a strong position T64 -- 4 cities, 3 workers (will pump another 1/2 out soon), all worker techs. So many possibilities from this point -- HA or elepult Justinian, or sit back and prep for a Conq stomp.

 

[floydmcw]

Two questions:

Spoiler Questions :

1. At T72 have just finished Writing (and all worker techs). Should I research Aesthetics as trade bait? I've heard that Aes is not prioritized by the AI and can be traded around. Just want to check that's true since I don't have any need for Aesthetics myself. (Difficulty level is Immortal, I have met 4 other AIs.)

2. I should befriend Justy and not try to rush him, right? He founded Buddhism which will spread to me, with +7 shared religion bonus we can be BFF.

Also he has 5 cities, might be more than a rush could handle.

 

[krikav]

@floydmcw

Spoiler :

1. Whats the best tradebait varies from map to map... depends on alot of things. The AIs have flavours and some are quite keen on culture. Hammurabi springs to mind. When there are alot of those around going for some military tech for tradebait might actually be better, but aestethics is generally the best and overwhelmingly most common.
The usual suspects are: aestethics, CoL, HBR, MC and Compass.
They give 80% of the beaker value of your techs in exchange, so if you are trading one tech for another equally expensive you need to have 20% done on the other one yourself. Monopoly techs and other things add or subtract some value but I don't really know how that works.
But the 80% rule is very helpful when deciding how much to put into alpha to get it in trade.

Here on this map, I think I would prefer going CoL. Isabella is expansive and granaries are easy to get up anyway, slavey is not dearly needed.
And with spi you can jump in and out anyway.
So I would almost certainly go CoL rather than aestethics for tradebait. It's also abit more expensive and that makes it easier to get all the stuff you want (monarchy, alpha, math, IW).


2.
Yeah, Justinian is super easy to buddy up with, pleased in an instant and then you are safe. Rather easy to get to friendly too, good ally.
Also, he often likes to send missionaries which is lovely.
I didn't scout his land, but thats a factor too.
If it's the choice of taking lush land from him, or charging through the jungle to get some brown stink from Fredrich... well, than it's time to break that alliance.
But if you secured about as much land as I did, there is no rush at all. Let them develop land and cities and clear the jungle while you tech to conqs, the invunerable cuir that has recieves defensive bonuses.

 

[drewisfat]

I would go Aesthetics - GLib - Liberalism.
- Isabella is the best leader for Lib breakouts as she has the strongest cuir rush with her conqs, and the strongest cannons with citadels, so you can pick which method you feel most comfortable with.
- GLib is the most popular wonder because it makes putting several scientist bulbs into the Lib pathway very easy.
- We have marble so GLib is affordable.
- Judging from krikav's game we have plenty of land. The main reason to attack before liberalism is that you were unable to get enough land.
- I don't play IMM, but I would still favor Aesthetics over Alphabet unless I had a high commerce start. This isn't a high commerce start.
- Aesthetics *is* a valuable tech on its own in this situation. We can't build wealth yet, but we can failgold wonders of which Aesthetics enables three. Parthenon in particular is nice since we'll get double the failgold with marble. SoZ is boosted by Ivory which we also have, so that could be helpful in the event you already built the required monuments.
- If you get CoL first, well you found Confucianism, which is counterproductive to letting Justinian spread his religion to you for diplo reasons. If you get CoL second, then it's not a monopoly tech and so it won't really have more trade value than Aesthetics.

 

[krikav]

@drewisfat good and valid points!

But don't expect much on the failgold arena... I hoped for some timely cash from SH but they didn't build it until T70+ something.
And on my ending screenshot, it's possible to whip oracle to completion, T84.
I have tried some imm games lately (this one and a brennus one) and I have realized that my timings get totally off.

If you found a religion, do the AIs stop spreading? Is that only a early game thing, because I do recall them sending missionaries even after I have bulbed philo too, but religious cities perhaps get much lower priority in the AIs eyes?

 

[drewisfat]

Well I'm not sure if it affects the AI's decision to actively spread, but in cities with a religion already there will be no autospread and missionaries can start failing.

As for failgold, I've never really been deterred by the delay. It's not that important to get the gold early at this phase of the game imo, and no amount of delay will make me think 2x gold isn't worth it. If there's a big delay, that just means I'm building that wonder in multiple cities. Also a bit gambler's fallacy to say that since a couple wonders were late, they all will be. It makes it more likely the remaining AI are isolated/not wonderboys. But Freddy and Joao can build wonders, and Justinian is a 6/10. Just make sure to trade Aesth around (which we would anyway) especially to Justin, making sure he also gets Poly. If you're nervous about it, or Justin's at war, you can wait a bit before you start putting hammers into failgold.

 

[floydmcw]

@drewisfat good and valid points!

But don't expect much on the failgold arena... I hoped for some timely cash from SH but they didn't build it until T70+ something.
And on my ending screenshot, it's possible to whip oracle to completion, T84.
I have tried some imm games lately (this one and a brennus one) and I have realized that my timings get totally off.

T84 Oracle is really late. I normally play Emperor and it typically is built in the T65-80 range.

Also from your earlier reply to me:

Spoiler The element between Manganese and Cobalt :

Let them develop land and cities and clear the jungle while you tech to conqs, the invunerable cuir that has recieves defensive bonuses.

Horses get you halfway to conqs. I actually got iron in my game, did you? Or do you plan to trade for it.

This game is going quite well. A 12-turn golden age helped me get Liberalism on T147.

 

[krikav]

@floydmcw

Spoiler :

Oh! Iron, did you see my game in the "Deity Gilgamesh Fun Times"?

But yes, trading for iron is usually possible and often you just need it for one turn. Or you can sometimes send out a late settler and settle on some godawful spot in the ice/tundra.

screenshots!

 

[floydmcw]

@krikav

Spoiler :

Oh! Iron, did you see my game in the "Deity Gilgamesh Fun Times"?

Just read it, as I expected the AI charges extortionate rates. How long were you paying Pacal 109 per turn?

Or you can sometimes send out a late settler and settle on some godawful spot in the ice/tundra.

Traded for iron on T92 and was unhappy to see none in my borders. But then a wandering warrior found:

Founded a city there T117. No food, but it also has gold and dyes so no complaints.

Here's my T148 save after Lib'ing Nat and trading for MC. Plan is Gunpowder then MT; will complete Taj for a 12-turn golden age.

I built Sistine for failgold but might finish it, would help with Justy's borders and for border popping the cities I will take from Freddy.

 

[krikav]

@floydmcw

Spoiler :

What I always do when I trade for iron is to add something from my part, that can be pillaged. say... they give me iron and I give them 150gpt and stone.
I then upgrade my cuirs and then pillage my stone. What I think happends then is that I get to pay 150g but then nothing else.
But in that game I traded with my target, so I didn't really worry about that, the deal is off when I DoW.
Had the deal active 2 turns there I think.

Often I find myself wanting to finish sistine too when I failgold for it. It's a neat wonder to have, but when you are in the position you are, the failgold can really be better, it's 2-4 cuirs and 2-4 more cuirs can make a huge difference. With SPI, you can jump in and out of caste for borderpops if you need them.
You can also gift music+marble to your target and hope they build it for you, than you get the best of both worlds!

When teching the last parts for a cuir-upgrade attack, I always go heavy on HAs, it's nice to way overbuild them because a flock of 20-30 HAs can tag along the cuirs for a long time, they can take workers, pillage, scout and finish off weak targets, then you just upgrade the ones with the best XP as you go along.

It's also good to whip a HA, then put the overflow into for example sistine, and then put hammers into a new HA and then repeat the process, sync cities so you have overflow comming from one city at the time. That way you get much more and much more efficiently than if you just slow-build sistine in one city.