[BTS] Immortal Isolation Desperation

[Lain]

Today I lost all my wisdom teeth. More than ever I seek wisdom in Civ IV to make up for that.

Having recorded a couple of wins on Deity lately, I went back to an Immortal map from a month ago. I lost then and it wasn't even close. Just pathetic really. But surely, with my newfound knowledge and deep understanding of the game I gained by now, I would crush this map and once and for all establish myself as a Deity player. Right? Wrong!

Immortal
Fractal
No Huts
No Events
Normal speed
Cathy
Isolation

I will attach 4 save games documenting my downfall. Some spoilers with short write ups for each point in the game. Just mentioning right now: I didn't go for the Great Lighthouse. Yeah, you can easily get it on this map. But what's the point? It would just paper over the cracks of the inferior player that I am right now. Next Isolation game I start inland and can't do crap because "lolol no GL how do I win this I suck"

If I can't beat Immortal Isolation without Great Abusehouse, Pyramids or crap like that, I don't even deserve to roll a Deity game or make comments on them really. In fact, I won't play a single Deity game until I win 5 Immortal Isolation games in a row with the weakest leaders there are (so not counting this one). Otherwise I just feel ashamed. Even the painkillers that are running through my body right now can't numb that shame. And I have that drive to eradicate that feeling.

Maybe I will document my progress in this thread, playing those different Immortal Isolation games and try to pinpoint exactly how I went from embarrassing myself to winning this stuff blindfolded. In that case I would kindly ask someone to roll the maps for me so I don't have to check WB for Isolation and get spoiler-cheese. Nothing makes me more mad than seeing Horses in your starting BFC and then alter your tech path which you wouldn't do normally because you just have 2 dry corn.

But first things first: ANY advice based on this current game is greatly appreciated, but please no mention of Great Lighthouse. Only WW I got is Kremlin with Communism Monopoly and that should be more than you need for this level. I don't want to play gambits, I want to win everything with solid play that doesn't rely on AI wonder dates early game. Just as I never learned to play Chess properly by playing Gambits and ignoring the fundamentals which you can always rely upon in any position.

1 AD

Spoiler :

So I settled my landmass. 8 cities. There is some more land to the left, I will put 3 more cities there soon, getting a total of 11. After Writing and backfilling worker techs I beelined Monarchy. Pure madness maybe? But I don't know how to grow cities otherwise and I wanted to work many cottages and set up my Empire long-term.

After that Maths, Currency, CoL ... got religion, I don't like that cheese. I prefer not getting the religion, makes the game easier too and who wants that? Anyway, going Civil Service now. Going to move Capital to Novgorod, Moscow will be GP farm. So far so good? Doesn't feel like I screwed up too badly... yet.

940 AD

Spoiler :

I figured I would let the AI find me and concentrate on early Oxford and Lib. After reading up on Isolation Games in this forum I thought that is sort of the more conventional approach. And it's not like my land is too terrible or anything.

Education just in. I don't know about bulbing in a game like this? I think I got 2 academies (Moscow early-game and then in my new capital Novgorod) ... bulbed Philosophy 1 turn before researching Civil Service for double civic switch to Buro/Paci. Seemed like a good idea but who knows? I might be losing my mind too.

1350 AD

Spoiler :

So Persia is sort of running away with the game, soon going to cap Mongolia aswell for 3 vassals (though at least one of them is peace-vassal I think).

I went full cottages, beelining Communism for Kremlin and then rush-buy army and stomp someone. In theory at least.

1804 AD

Spoiler :

So it's like 400 years later and I still didn't conquer crap. Shame. Desperation. Don't know what happened. Plan was Fighter/Bomber/Tanks but with Naval Invasion I need so many different units and Transporters and Battleships and Aircraft, Infantry, Tanks... even with abusing rush-buy apparently it is just too slow?

Or do I have to capitulate someone with Cannons in a game like that to gather momentum and boost research? I don't know anymore.

Some "key dates" from this chapter.

1390 AD: Communism
1505 AD: Democracy
1555 AD: Assembly Line
1695 AD: Flight
1760 AD: Industrialism

I actually went on to cap Joao, Ragnar and Hyuana. But by then (1860 AD or something) Persia was basically ready to launch spaceship, also close to culture. On top of that he DoW'd me anyway when I was getting ready to raze his capital. He used 20 Nukes, I didn't even have Laser. Modern Tanks, 60 Gunships... and I called it a game.

Please help .

 

[Fippy]

Imo this map has some nice land, 2 happy resis with gold and furs (so no urgent need for Pyras).

I would have used marble for Aesthetics and Lit, Glib and maybe also Pantheon are especially great in Iso for GS bulbs.

Besides that, you are in troubles cos you did not do enuf for great peoples
Philo bulb (Paci), 2x Astro bulbs and sometimes Machinery too (with Aest. you have all requirements).

Besides marble you also had gold for Shwedi, in Iso it's important using failgold resis.

 

[Fippy]

lol BiC, nice food..marble..rivers at Cap and plenty floodplains not far away, gold & furs for early happy resis.
You guys need to talk with Tachy about deity masochist maps, yup yup

 

[shakabrade]

I actually played Deity Isolation quite frequently as I am a huge fan of Fractal (played 80% games that map script) and on Fractal Isolation happens.

Deity isolation is actually easy as you will never get an early double DoW which could actually kill you. Therefore win percentage of these maps should be higher. I could even say that I cannot lose Deity Isolation. The whole philosophy is to get contact as early as possible and bulb Astro (expect it around 450AD) and then you are at tech parity and lot of land (soon even a tech leader).

I'll try to demonstrate it on this map in couple of days. Do you have 4000BC save?

 

[Lain]

Ok so what I learned so far:

- Faster settling
- Earlier fishing for more commerce
- More care for bulbing and GPP (didn't someone somewhere say that bulbing is weaker in isolation because you can't trade?)
- Use marble and don't be reluctant to go for wonders

What would your tech path be in this game? Writing-Aesthetics-Literature ... then Monarchy? Or no Monarchy, but how do you grow cities? Or no need to grow cities, just use Specs and build Worker-Settler? Math, Currency... I feel like something is way too slow here. Can I get 450 AD Astronomy like this?
For bulbing I also need Alphabet which sucks.

Then do I rather bulb Astronomy than go for Education/Lib first?

One major problem I have seems to be... I don't know how to attack. I need to get a stack to capitulate someone, because how do I get reinforcements in? AI usually controls naval battle. I feel like I never have enough production to pull it off. So I need what, 25 Rifles and 20 Cannons? That takes ages to get. + 11 Galleons.

@shakabrade, I would really appreciate a playthrough of course . And from any others aswell. I don't really know about tech path and what pace to choose in early game. I attach save.

But bottom line is: Set up more bulbs, get early Astro for contact and then control pace of the game.

I agree I made a lot of mistakes with Fishing etc. But it would be interesting to know where exactly I lost the game, because even 1000 AD it looks like good position. Even without perfect play you would think I can win from there, but I can't. Why not?

I really want to become comfortable at playing Isolation. I feel like the skills I have to learn for that would benefit me in any other game later aswell.

 

[shakabrade]

I need what, 25 Rifles and 20 Cannons? That takes ages to get. + 11 Galleons.

Or if your target has a neighbour you can park your army on your target's border as soon as you produce it. Then you can do with less galleons and more units. Galleon chains are also an option, but often you'll find in isolation that people already have Frigates and Privateers who can disrupt you.

 

[Kallikrates]

Did you play some of the harder "Lonely hearts" maps on IMM? I found them (on Emperor and IMM) a pretty good training for isolation (or generally). I am still struggling on IMM (not having played for almost a year), that is I need decent maps and some luck. But I won an isolation spacerace with Pacal on IMM recently (on a crappy island, I probably do not have an initial savefile left but I can maybe post a later one). It was a crazy game because the AP civs wrecked most of my trade by forcing me (who had one city that received the AP religion after contact by astronomy) into trade embargos and "cold" wars (I only killed a few ships and thwarted half-assed invasion attempts). Fortunately the AIs were constantly warring among themselves, so nobody got even close to staging a decent invasion of my home island.
Obviously, some traits are far stronger in isolation. And poor maps can be very frustrating. I decided that I will quit isolation/semi-isolation games without at least one (better two) early happiness resource or without at least one "granary resource". (The "unfairness of maps" is still one of my major quibbles with the game. Two-gold or gems capital is almost like playing a level lower... I think the calendar resources should all get at least one more trade or some other bonus because they become available so late. But they are all worse than precious metals and the latter get their happiness bonus doubled by a mandatory building...)

 

[Imploding]

Lonely hearts

http://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/lonely-hearts-club-bullpen.250960/#post-6148900
Great I did not know about the maps! Seems like a lot of fun maps to try!

 

[Lain]

So I replayed a bit (save attached) ... I tried starting with Fishing, but somehow didn't like it. I still got it a bit earlier this time.

I got Glib and Parthenon for GP Farm, moved capital... CoL just in, it is 100 AD now. If I go straight for Astronomy bulb now, I can't get Civil Service, right? Otherwise GS will bulb Paper. So is it really a good idea to go for Astro right now?

@shakabrade I saw some Save from you playing "Lonely Brennus" some years ago http://forums.civfanatics.com/threa...ts-edition-chapter-lxxv-brennus.451961/page-2 here you got Astro quite late. 1200 AD or so I think. But you still won the game easily. So I just wonder what my biggest problem is?

Even without really strong play and bulbing action, I shouldn't lose a game like this I think?

Really looking forward to your demonstration of strategy on a map like this

In Isolation, does anyone ever go early Monarchy? Or just live with small cities?

@BornInCantaloup I have to be more careful about settling speed. Without AI around I lack some benchmark for expansion and I tend to screw it up quite a bit. So it's good that you point it out.

In my game I produced army with Kremlin and rush-buy, but it was way too late by then. Too slow. Persia ran away with the game.

@Kallikrates I know the series and I read many write-ups there. Didn't play many of those though. I just ignored my problems playing Isolation so far. But now I really want to improve that. I want to play some games in this thread. Though first I want to feel like I actually understand how to play this. So far I really don't. I need some theory first

So when you look at my save now... is it better than before? Do I go Civil Service-Lib-route or quick Astro? I think I can't do both because of bulbing preferences, right?

Actually... I shouldn't have gone Caste . Need to whip Galleys. But yeah, apart from that.

 

[shakabrade]

Lol, how awkward. Well, we all began somewhere.

In Isolation, Monarchy is often a very good choice.

 

[shakabrade]

This one was played yesterday and got to winning position. Astro date was 475AD and I have a tech advantage over all of the guys, I'd say. Only 7 cities. Soon, I'll get another GS reserved for Education bulb on Lib path.
However, Mansa is very weak in my game. Cyrus is doing well but is not fast enough to stop Cuirs (still not sure) or Cannons (definitely but that'd be slower) once they come into play. Plan is to set the Globe Theatre (for non stop whipping) in Capital as there are maybe 3 production cities and others will need to work those cottages.
First targets will be Joao followed by Raggy and then HC. They can die from Trebs + Maces/Xbows. Order and unit composition can still change as there is a lot of time until the attack, but I definitely need their land to have a strong production on the other continent. Just got almost 800 gold from failing Parthenon. I'll also fail Shwedagon Paya and will probably be able to sustain max bpt (around 250 atm) for at least 20 turns. I'd judge my winning date to be around 1500AD (judging your victory date is essential to assess viability of buildings and stuff).

Some screenies and tech path (if I can remember it) will be provided when I get back from work but, for instance, nation was Gluten-free until ADs.
I cannot say that this was an optimal play as I am far from perfect.

 

[Lain]

Hey Shaka, thanks for playing . If you could upload save from 475 AD, I could check tech path and expansion speed myself, so you don't have to remember . I think I would learn a lot from that.

Actually, would be very grateful for Save, because I can analyse everything. Sometimes Screenies don't tell the whole story.

 

[Kallikrates]

I am not sure if it is sensible to deliberately forgo e.g building the pyramids. The land is not good but not terribly bad either, it's mainly that Cathy's traits are almost useless in isolation and there is poor synergy (with random fractal maps it seems almost a rule that with fishing as starting tech I get a "land capital" and without one with seafood resources..). But with two wonder resources on the island I would usually try culture. It would be a rather nice map for Ramesses, Louis or any philosophical leader (Not the least because apart from all the other isolation difficulties invasions with galleons are a major PITA. I did not finish some games where I was clearly ahead and could have won domination but was simply too lazy to do yet another bloody invasion to get over 64%) In any case not to build wonders in isolation with both resources seems not following the rule of "playing the map". I don't have enough time or energy to ever really try deity (but emperor is usually too easy, unless the map totally sucks), so I have to play immortal and there will be some frustrating games. But I am not going to make it harder for myself then necessary... I think there are some cases when there is little one can do in isolation if the others are all in contact and one of them runs away in tech and power.
This is simply bad luck because a slightly different configuration could lead to frequent wars among the AI and keep them in check.

 

[Kallikrates]

I am wondering how bad idle worker turns are. Of course they should be avoided if possible. But if one goes AH - fishing - BW the worker can only improve the fur that comes into moscow's culture (but will probably not be needed for while) while waiting for BW. If one goes BW - fishing one can mine the hill sheep and then chop away. But growth is slower because it takes longer to develop the food resources.
(Stuff like this is one reason why I tend to re-roll if the synergy of starting techs and capital resources is very poor...)

 

[Fippy]

AH first is much better imo, with 2 sheep.
Fishing can be delayed for some time, cos you already have food and warriors are also very helpful early.
So for me, looks like AH - bronze.

 

[shakabrade]

I went AH - Bronze. Otherwise, worker has nothing to do. Better to chop those Workboats.

 

[Lain]

Thanks a lot . I just started looking at it. How would you continue the game?

- You said something about Trebs... and meanwhile win Lib? What will you pick?
- I am still not 100% sure how you get army from these cities, just whip Trebs and stuff and move it with some Galleons to Ragnar territory for attack on Portugese?
- Did you think about moving Capital to Flood Plain-City and go for Oxford? Or not worth it with 1500 AD win anyway I guess.
- Nice bulbing... Is that early date for Astro only possible with Great Library or Philo leader? Or would you skip Literature/Music then maybe?
- Settling the stuff in the west with Galleys would slow you down too much? But with Astro you will probably get it now?

I feel like I'm learning a lot. Thanks again, it's really helpful.

Hope it was nice warm-up for Masochist version next . Good luck.

 

[Lain]

So as I mentioned, I am currently only playing Immortal Isolation until I feel worthy of playing "normal" Deity games again.

This one with Cathy I won, got Astronomy 500 AD and attacked with Cuirs... I still don't understand how you could attack earlier with Trebs and stuff. Seems too slow and AI will have Gunpowder already. I never managed an overseas attack at Trebs era. Usually all cities are too weak and I still want to win Lib. So I would still love a demonstration of that. I know it's possible of course, but not for me at this moment in time .

So I rolled a new start with Toku. Fractal map and checked WB until I got Isolation confirmed. No Great Lighthouse of course.

960 AD

Spoiler :

So I got Astro 600 AD. Built Great Library with Marble and then bulb action. Felt like you can't settle many cities in this land so I stayed small and compact (6 cities?) until all preparations for Astro were done. I put Academy in Capital because I felt that base research is a bigger problem than getting enough GS for bulbs here.

I attached 960 AD save, please comment on any mistakes you see .

1540 AD

Spoiler :

Again I prepared soo long for actually launching an attack. Hope you can see the pattern of my problem and maybe point to an improvement for specifically this issue -> transition from bulbing Astronomy to launching an attack is too slooooooooooow.

Decided to attack India who vassaled Monty. But meh, probably I'm just lucky that nobody has Rifling or Steel yet. Or this would be disaster already.

I made two stacks. Again Save attached for reference.

#1



#2



Empire



Tech

1846 AD

Spoiler :

I conquered India and Aztecs. Zara is Friendly to me and Pacal built the UN. So Zara will vote for me next time (first election Zara had more pop than me so he + Pacal were candidates, next time will be me + Pacal) and I win. Currently I am conquering Boudica (vassaled soon) and Pacal would be next. That should be Domination anyway.

So yeah, I won this one. Happiness. But disappointment about late attack date is bigger. 1500 AD Rifle/Cannons is a joke and will cost me the game in other circumstances. Please advise on this particular problem . I feel like I have an idea for the early game thanks to you guys.

My "strategy" at the moment is to stay small and compact with 6-8 cities until preparations for Astro are done, then settle the rest. Unless there is great land of course or important resource. More than that will stifle my economy too much. Then I would have to play different game I feel. Like go for Lib and don't bother with early Astro (because I need stuff like Currency + Civil Service to keep up economy... at the moment I skip both)

But currently my main problem comes after all that. Slow transition for attack will cost me many games.

What do I do to solve that?

Cry

Rolled new game with Charly next (2/5 worst leaders) and I don't have marble or anything. Astro won't come before 700 AD. This will be discussed next. Hope I can win at least

 

[Lain]

To me, Immortal Isolation is harder than the average Deity game right now. Of those I won like 4 in a row. Immortal Isolation though? Barely scraping, last one with Charly I won Diplo a few turns before AI space win. Meh. If I managed this better I could become a much more complete player.

Thanks @BornInCantaloup for sharing your thoughts. Makes a lot of sense. To be honest, I never even used Windmills so far. Of course silly when you think about it.

GPP is an area that I'm struggling with a lot. Concrete example: I build the Pyramids so I want Rep scientists as soon as possible.

Do I still grow to happy cap first?
Do I whip infrastructure (more than Granary)?
What is better: pop 5 with 2 scientists or pop 8 working coast tiles and then hiring 4 scientists (Caste)?
Always grow to happy cap as a rule of thumb?

I don't know these things. If I don't have marble or Philo trait I also struggle to generate my GP. I get an early one for Academy and then I am too late for Philo bulb. Last Deity game I didn't bulb anything on my way to Lib because second GP came at like 300 AD and it was an Engineer. I still got Lib and won the game comfortably by the way. But there are serious flaws for sure.

In Isolation, I feel I can't afford more than 6-7 cities if I skip Currency, CoL, Civil Service and everything to go for Astro bulb. At least not cities like plains cow or far away stuff. That's why I didn't really explore my land or took the barb city. Starting to think that letting the AI find you might be a more valid approach in some cases. Sit back and get Oxford up.

Why take Nationalism off of Liberalism ? Bulbing towards Steel/Rifling would seem better, considering those were the military techs you went after.
Did you intend to build the Taj Mahal and miss on it ?

Was just pressured to get Lib earlier than I liked and not many people had Nationalism. I managed to trade for Printing Press rather easily after that.

I rely too much on the whip I feel. Whipping Tanks in Police State all the time feels somehow wrong and not that sustainable. Only recently started to question tile improvements a bit more and playing around with workshops more frequently.

Might post the Charly game here next. With some earlier screenshots too. Or more regular Deity writeups, seems like an easier game .

 

[Lain]

Yes, helped a lot . Thanks. A lot to digest though, will try to implement those points into my future games.

So I went for Deity Isolation this time. And I took more saves and will write in more detail about the game.

Here is the starting save and my latest one (600 AD). Will post more thorough with earlier dates tomorrow. Too much Civ4 for today . At least in terms of playing myself, now going for some AZ video as lullaby of course.

Starting position (Mehmed... I think this is the first good leader I got for weeks now, jeez). I rolled 2x Toku in a row even.

Spoiler :

Great Lighthouse or Pyramids?