LK154 - CCM - Bablyon

[Jersey Joe]

It is nice to see total death with Indo-China, the Dutch, and the Aztecs. So far we have left way to many civs mostly dead (Canada, Israel, and Nubia) due to cities on the other side of the choke point. That was a very enjoyable set.

Do not forget the large stack of settlers I left. We should raze some stuff past the choke point to give us safe healing cities.

I get a laugh that we had another major success turn despite losing 100+ units.

I suspect we still need more workers. With that much new land, I am sure a lot of the crews were busy railing to new conquests.

Lee, you did open the way to what I did. If I could have captured the last Dutch city sooner the Aztec would have be gone sooner.

France gets added to the list of mostly dead. They have a city north of America.

Hopefully none of the mostly dead have a settler at sea.

Should we build bombers? The 1 bomber I had drop bombs on Washington actually injured a US rifleman. The hard part would be keeping the bombers close enough to a fast moving front to be able to bomb someone

 

[Northern Pike]

Should we build bombers? The 1 bomber I had drop bombs on Washington actually injured a US rifleman. The hard part would be keeping the bombers close enough to a fast moving front to be able to bomb someone

Yes, you've identified one of the two reasons I consider bombers to be almost useless, the other being that they waste so many attacks destroying city improvements and killing the population.

 

[Elephantium]

I LIKE bombers, especially for plinking at stacks in the open, but they're not terribly useful when you need to reposition them every other turn. In a game like this, about half a dozen recon planes / zeppelins are about all we need.

 

[LKendter]

I think we have heard from everyone except the one up next.
ROSTER:

LKendter
Greebley (up)
Jersey Joe (swapped)
Elephantium (on deck)
Northern Pike (vacation to Sep 20)

 

[Greebley]

ok, I got it.

We will likely have some bombers (or fighters?) as they can find boats and sink them which helps with the settlers. Not a lot for the reasons listed

 

[Greebley]

Have played until 1836 so far.

Here is the report so far:

1833 AD: Since we now own our side of the continent, I look at filling the holes. Build a town to cover a swampy area that will be good in the future. For the desert, I can build another town and can use two artists (needs 1000) to grab all but 4 squares. Those squares we can get by moving Tamuin and getting 100 culture which we can do without a monk or artist.

Up north 4 towns cover the largest holes. This leaves scattered locations of a few more mostly coastal squares that may not be covered.
I also determine Arabia has one of the best maps to steal in terms of uncovering lands we may get to next. Turns out that despite them being next to us, we haven't met them so I use an outpost to do so. Try Spain too but that fails.
Of those we are at war with:
Israel has 3 cities behind Nubia
France has 1 city behind America
Greeks have 3 scattered cities; one close, one behind Nubia, and one a bit further.
Canada have 3 north but way over on the other side of the map. Its too bad as they are still rich.
Nubia has 5 with four near us and one way south.
Looks like American's 12 cities are all together (they could easily have a settler though)
We are fighting Korea, Mongols, Carthage and, Egypt, who are untouched - Mongols are behind US and Korea is reachable, but I think we want to attack Poland before them.

So we could make Peace with Egypt and Carthage and War with Poland.

Seems we haven't met Turkey, Poland, or Persia.

There are a lot of enemy boats on our coast. I switch 3 cities to the Bombers for now so we can drive them all home (often a single hit will turn them around).

US War:
Noticed the Abandon xx towns, so I am going to use that for unneeded towns. I first abandon all but one existing abandon xx (10 was in an ok spot so renamed Fried Clams).

Abandon 01 built (and garrison) to get to Philadelphia. We start with 4 losses in a row. I won't bother counting the dead; I would lose track but you can assume they are similar to other turns.

I abandon Philadelphia and Heavens Hill to build cities to bring the enemy cities close enough.

Capture Atlanta. It is a good place to use a Great Artist so I do so. Got a leader so a town gets Electric Power.

Capture St Louise near Hoboken Hill (was Heavens hill but smaller)

Capture Miami as well; New Orleans falls easily.

Finally we Capture Houston.

Five more Hotchkiss allow us to attack Boston, but it is a waste; we do poorly so units will just heal.

Greeks:
Capture Knossos and use a Great Artist. It is bordered by countries we aren't at war with.

Random attacks on Arabic units (not at war) give us a Monk.

Note: I set a portion of our Workers to automated wetland clearing. I like this because:
1) Like damage clearing, they all stop when finished.
2) We will always want to remove wetlands eventually
3) It is fairly efficient if you have speed 2 Workers (Speed 1 you should road all wetlands first)
This and clear damage are the two automation I feel are acceptable.



IBT: We hold off minor attacks by USA and Mongols.

We get flips:
Dongola (formally of the Nubians) - It turns out to be a town I build 'Desert Square Grabbing' really close to it so it will be easy to retake.
Also Buffalo Trace

1834 AD:
The HandleyPage Bomber is Enormous; bigger than the city...



Not that it matters of course; just a plane that size would be impressive.

Attacking Buffalo Trace we get a leader which rushes Heavy Industry.

Taking back Dongolo. Nubian cities are worth a lot (8k) this discovery will be bad for the Nubians.

Capture Boston which is a tough nut. Size 26 (but no garrison)

Size 1 Dallas is destroyed

Detroit, Buffalo, and Mongol Tsetserleg all have forest, so I will move the speed1 attackers and Artillery for next round set up.

Capture Wawat (Nubian) for nearly 6k gold. Wawat is oddly surrounded by troops of Austria Hungary. Not sure if they were attacking or coming after us. Also Capture Sha'at to get up to 55k.

Sadly the first Hotchkiss retreats to a Austrian Pike.
We do gain a Great Artist used on Wawat to reach other Nubian cities.
Even with a Garrison we lose a Hotchkiss to a Pike.

Capture Grenoble and we have destroyed the Glorious French



An attempt to reach Cincinnati next turn fails; we cannot push back the border until Buffalo falls. We can only 2 out of 3 US cities and it will take 2 turns to see if we can destroy the US.

Move many units to take 3 cities next turn.

We gain a slave. I also created several Constcripts to kill weak Austrians. We will have regular Infantry because of this.

IBT: Mongols attack out.
Austria Hungary Damages some units in
India had pact with Mongols and declares war.

1835 AD: We capture Buffalo losing one of two Flame Throwers. Move the rest of the troops to take out Cincinnati next turn.

Against Detroit our 3 Artillery units are all destroyed doing very little damage. Our Hotchkiss finish them off.

For the Mongols Tserleg also falls; they attacked out so the defenders were damaged.

One of our two remaining Slavers dies to a 1 hp knight.

Get a Great Artist vs Austria

Two leaders this turn for rushed E power.

We can also build Abandon 02 to capture Baruun-Urt

Another Monk created attacking Austrian 1hp Knight

We end up not using many units because in all directions are towns with Forest that we cannot reach without speed 3 units. Thus we line up attacks for the 3 towns we can reach.

IBT: No issues just minor attacks from Mongol and the continuous bombardment.
Our bombers are starting to send boats home though...

Just played this turn to taking of Cincinnati. We get:



Here is the current front. I moved all units out of Poland I am thinking of declaring war now.

Looks like Korea will be here soon.

 

[LKendter]

Nice to see more civs totally dead.

We are breaking out past the choke point nice.

With America toasted, we are in great shape. IIRC that wipes the last civ that is a tech threat.

 

[Greebley]

Since it sounds like version 2.0 of CCM is still a bit away, I had a concept for another game. The concept is to use all the units and try them out.

1) We go with Republic/Democracy as long as there is new tech to get (we can choose anything after gaining the last tech).
2) All but Conquest/Domination victories turned off (otherwise space or Victory will occur) Conquest is better.
3) (optional) I think it may be better to help out civs falling behind by giving them tech
4) Limit on attacking civs:
a) In the first age we cannot take any cities.
b) In the second age we can attack cities/destroy at most 5 civs
c) In the third age at most 10 civs
d) In the fourth age at most 20 civs
e) The final 11 require all tech to be known before they can be attacked.

For the spirit of the game we shouldn't leave the weakest for last but still have a decent opponent.

This game would likely last longer than usual, but I think we should finish before 2.0. If not we can likely start a 2.0 game; it would be in the early game while wrapping up this one so the long turns don't conflict.

What do you think? The endgame units don't get played much; this would see how they play out.

 

[Jersey Joe]

Since it sounds like version 2.0 of CCM is still a bit away, I had a concept for another game. The concept is to use all the units and try them out.

1) We go with Republic/Democracy as long as there is new tech to get (we can choose anything after gaining the last tech).
2) All but Conquest/Domination victories turned off (otherwise space or Victory will occur) Conquest is better.
3) (optional) I think it may be better to help out civs falling behind by giving them tech
4) Limit on attacking civs:
a) In the first age we cannot take any cities.
b) In the second age we can attack cities/destroy at most 5 civs
c) In the third age at most 10 civs
d) In the fourth age at most 20 civs
e) The final 11 require all tech to be known before they can be attacked.

For the spirit of the game we shouldn't leave the weakest for last but still have a decent opponent.

This game would likely last longer than usual, but I think we should finish before 2.0. If not we can likely start a 2.0 game; it would be in the early game while wrapping up this one so the long turns don't conflict.

What do you think? The endgame units don't get played much; this would see how they play out.

Interesting idea. Instead of Democracy, I would prefer either Fascism or Communism.

 

[Greebley]

I was thinking we would want the tile bonus. I am ok with allowing us to choose a non-monarchy govt after we have run republic for a while.

 

[Elephantium]

Agreed, interesting idea. I'd play that

 

[Northern Pike]

I think Greebley's idea needs a little fine-tuning. The early game would be boring if we couldn't attack another civ until 1100 AD, which is when we reached the second age in this game. I'd say that we would certainly want to let ourselves conquer one rival, and maybe two, in the first age.

OTOH, the later restrictions may not be severe enough if the goal is to use all the units, since we'd probably win by domination in the fourth age unless we steadily disbanded cities, which is tedious.

Two other possible challenges would be to play the whole game in despotism, and to play at Sid.

 

[LKendter]

The one idea I've been toying with is the Xenophobic civ.
It has just one simple rule - we can never capture an AI city, and must raze all even those with wonders. Early wars should give us a huge worker advantage, but our core would be small until build settlers arrive.
We will probably need to beat a lot of discounts out of the other AIs, and hope for one rich one near us.

 

[Dwarven Zerker]

:Lurker comment:

I have wondered if leaving a plot of land within your borders large enough to attract "homeless" settlers could help with the settler crash problem when eliminating rival civs. Or would that be too much trouble since undesirable settlers would start trampling the lawn?

PS. Thanks for the screenshots Greebly!

 

[Greebley]

:Lurker comment:

I have wondered if leaving a plot of land within your borders large enough to attract "homeless" settlers could help with the settler crash problem when eliminating rival civs. Or would that be too much trouble since undesirable settlers would start trampling the lawn?

PS. Thanks for the screenshots Greebly!

I don't think it would be much help. Early on there is free land in many places. However, once that was the only free land every AI would send stuff and it would quickly fill.

---------------------------
I would be willing to try Xenophobic. It would be interesting too. (We might even be able to finish both before 2.0 actually)

To fix issues with my idea:
Conquest is the only allowed victory conditions (I think NP is correct).
Max dead civs or living civs that we have taken a city from:
first age - 2
second age - 6
third age - 12
fourth age - 20


As for Sid, I think the advantage is smaller in CCM because it is only +1 cities from the bonus settler rather than double cities (both starting cities making settlers) of normal civ.

I think we could play and win at Sid so I think it would be worth trying.

 

[Greebley]

This turn is reminding me of one very good way to deal with the settler issue - Hit the maximum number of Cities. I recall that I even having seen evidence of the AI disbanding a settler when this is hit. It is proving true this turn.

 

[Greebley]

Canada proves this isn't 100% (city count limit). I suspect a civ with a a settler at sea when the limit is hit might keep the settler but not send out more; They had (at least) two left. One was sitting in a town (not heading out because of the limit, so easy to catch, and one on a boat somewhere as they didn't die when they should.

So Canada will live past my turn...

 

[vmxa]

Lurker:

Too bad they did not use the old Homm rule. If you have no town, you have 7 days to get one or your gone.

 

[Civinator]

...the settler crash problem when eliminating rival civs.

The "houseboat-bug" is one of the hardcoded problems that was fixed by Firaxis in older versions of Civ 3 and was "reactivated" by changes Firaxis made in C3C. Here is an excerpt of the readme-file included in Civ III Complete:

***********************************
SID MEIER'S CIVILIZATION III README
***********************************

Additions v1.29f:
....
Fixed v1.21f:
......
* Fixed crash related to last settler dying on a transport.
.....
* Editor: Fixed bug that allowed rivers in water.
.....
Fixes v1.16f:
.....
* You no longer declare war by accidentally passing over a hidden submarine.

 

[Greebley]

1836 AD: Continued

Declare war on Poland

Nubia:
Capture Medju and Zatju
Nubia is down to the single 'hard to reach' final city. We are at war with all civs between it, but it means getting all the way past the Austrians in the South.



Large number of Korean Troops to the south. Not sure where they were going but are now in the way. Looks like this will be the opposite of last turn and use all our troops.

Used a Great Artist in Zatju but also gain a Monk and GA killing Koreans. I am likely to gain and lose many here. I will likely forget to mention some; Instead we are currently at 26 GA and 4 Monk now. I will give a count at the end.

Poland:
Capture Bydgoszcz guarded by Arquebusier.

After building Abandon 03, I start on Warsaw. Warsaw's Arquebusier cause 2 retreats and a loss. After that are Pike and many offensive units. I don't think Poland has gone to war and large number of units are just sitting in the cities. When done there are 40 attackers that won outside the city.

For L'vov I turn off battle animation. It requires Abandon 04. 36 Units needed with one loss.

Finally Abandon 05 and Torun which is eventually Captured.

Mongol:
Capture Erdenet that we lined up last turn. Abandon 03 allows us to also reach Kazan.
This is all the Mongol cities for now; poland makes a better current target to get a straight front.

There are enough Korean units that I wake up non-coastal, non-capitol defenders to use against all the FireLancers. After the battles, there is one stack of Knights and some stacks with Firelancers and longbow. All the Artillery units are gone that appeared in the north.

I think we got at least 4 leaders for Rushed Electric Power

We have no more Wetlands in our territory. All the workers will have stopped by next turn

IBT: Not sure where Korea thinks they are going. They must be at war with somone else. Their movement is odd.

Poland empty their cities with large numbers going on attack

Realized I forgot to leave defenders in one important class of cities. Ones with Resistance. Will fix that.

1837 AD:
Capture Zeilona Gora from Poland.

Build Abandon 06, 07, 08, 09 to get to six Polish cities(Wroclaw, Bialstok, Kalisz,gniezno, Gor. There are a lot of units to kill but the Hotchkiss will fight cities; Infantry will work on units. Another attack settler will get us to Gneizno as well, so 09 is also likely near there.



Poland has at least 12 cities. I cannot talk to them to get an exact count.

We capture all 6 cities above with minor losses. A monk gets us close enough to Krakow. We capture that as well.

Build south to build a new city that allows us to attack the Greek city. This is followed by the Hebrew city; I was hoping to get decent gold from this but it was less than 5k, and the other 3 cities that could net us 31k are all in Jungle and will likely wait.

We captured an Israeli motorized settler (instead of it turning into Workers).

We then go for two Mongol cities, Ulaanbaatar, and Karakorum

IBT: Some attacks on our units. Opole gets attacked so much, it gets a leader and then gets Captured by Korea killing said leader. They just had too many units (it was southmost, so speed 2 units could attack from the fog). Needless to say, many units fall to the Infantry guarding it.

Carthage also starts attacking and even drops the first landing I have seen (pike, 2 cavalry)

1838 AD: Kill off Landing.
Take back Opole and decided to use a Monk so it can't be attacked out of the fog anymore.

Capture Szczecin from Poland which we can now reach. This allows us to get to Olsztyn as well.

I finally I capture a Korean city Manpo. There is a lot of Austria Hungary speed 2 units, so I defend it.

Do unit cleanup to get units in our lands under better control. We won't advance much.
Get leaders of course, it is getting harder to find useful rushes.

BTW, I am using Uruk as the healing city because I can always find it by hitting h.

With the workers free from the Wetland duty, I go through the towns under 110 and 80 shields and get them above to get one turn hotchkiss and infantry as we can.

Also we have enough gold that I rush stuff this turn.

IBT: Austria Hungary decides to attack Manpo despite defense. They eventually overcome some of the Infantry.

Oh and looks like India is here as well, so another rush is incoming.

1839 AD: We can reach more Mongol cities (note that we get an even 10 culture a turn so every town expands after a single turn - It's really nice)

We capture Tabris, Daidu, Hovt. and Almalik.



We then take Gdansk from Poland.

Tried to get a look at Spain's world map but we fail and they declare. We do get Portugal's map.

Pozan owned by Korea sticks out, so I capture that as well

We then continue to clear our lands, leaving only a stack of 15, 6, and 4 random units all on the border. We use leaders to get Heavy Industry; I have set the best towns to them so I can find them. Otherwise I may rush a useless town's industry or power.

Continue to upgrade towns; I am going from highest shields to lowest (Skipped most already over 110 though). We have over 250 workers to do this with which seems sufficient. I have switched worker builds to Settlers.

We have optimized all cities with over 40 shields now. Some will need some more after they grow.

Rushed some more; especially to get towns finished with shield improvements so they can start on units.

We currently have 179 hotchkiss, 378 Infantry, and 545 workers (about half are used for the war front). We have fewer foreign workers (50-70?), I tend to use them for Garrisons.

We still have 40k gold.

NOTE: We have hit MAX Cities.

Rushed some boats so I can kill more ships. Some aren't heading home.

IBT: Not so much this turn. We are driving back the bombarding boats with the planes, so there is less and less bombardment.

1840 AD:

Move Abandon 08 and 09 to reach two more Mongol cities. Darkhan is the current Capitol and has several red-lined units that I don't think I caused. They might be at war though I see no signs of it. We also capture Erenholt

Against Korea:
We can reach Sariwon even without a settler and easily capture it. This allows us to reach and capture two more cities. We capture Pyongyang and Taejon. A Monk will allow us to reach Seoul and pyongsong. Doing this we lose a heck of a lot more units than expected. 3 and 4 losses for two of the cities for example. This is with Garrison support on our size and defense 4 vs our attack 9. However the losses is still smaller than the number of unit we get each turn

We can also reach Inchon from a border expansion now and capture it. This leaves Ulsan surrounded which can be gotten by moving Abandon 10.



Pusan is also within range and we capture it.

Poland's Lodz is also within range and we capture it.

Capture Suwon from Korea followed by Fustat.

Moved on the Hebrew town of Arnon lining up an attack for next turn.

I was considering stopping here but hit enter by accident; so onward...

IBT: Our attack on Israel pulls Persia (who we haven't met) into war with us.
More units beyond the first two Cavalry show up from India
Carthage head backwards, but captures some Workers I missed protecting with a Hussar.

1841 AD:

Get a Great Artist and Leader on same attack.

Capture Arnon from Israel, but it costs two Artillery type units.

Capture Paegam from Korea

Attempt to capture the final Polish city:



Capture Hyangsan from Korea after building Abandon 01.

Using a great artist and building Abandon 07 we are able to capture Cheju

Choir is auto-destroyed so I rebuild it.

I don't think I will see as many enemy units, so the need for Speed 2 units is becoming greater and we have many speed 1. I therefore switch 1 turn infantry builds to 2 turn Hotchkiss.

We have units left over so I build a town and use an Artist to take out Mongol towns:
We capture Dalanzadgad and Mandalgovi

Only one more Mongol city. Worth moving Abandon 05 and a great Artist.

Success:



IBT: Spot first Egyptian. India shows up with more fast troops.
Didn't defend Cloibalsan enough I think I had 3 or 4 defenders. Captured by Carthage.

1842 AD:
Start with captureing Chonju and Kaesong from Korea and they are gone:

Capture Ajolon from Israel which puts us back over 50k gold. They have only their Capitol now.

A single Hotchkiss auto-destroys the Greek City. It was along the lines Thallonica I think. They only have their capitol left.

The immense jungle is annoying. However, the Austrian town of Klagenfort has a single cleared square which means we should be able to grab it this turn and line up the kill for both Israel and Greece next turn.



I build the road to Kagelfort, Capture it and move Abandon 04 to where I can set up troops to Attack the Greek Capitol

We finally meet Turkey and steal their map (2nd try) which removes a large black area. We also try Mayans but get caught (no war).

Capture back Choibalsan from Carthiginian and Cirta too which is near it.

Using an Artist on Cirta can get us around the Mountains in Carthage. We can build a town to get to Hadrumetum. We do this and capture the city.



-----------------------
It just now occurred to me I am not using the ability of Settlers to move two squares - we always have owned the land that I place the Settler. Thus any previous statements of needing artists and such is not actually correct.

Too used to speed 1 from normal civ I guess.

We have 29 Great Artists still left so it is not really a problem.

--------------------
Abandon 06 (not using an Artist anymore) gets us to Utica which is a Tough nut with a lot of troops.

Move Abandon 06 again to get to Carthage itself. We capture it - it was not actually harder than Utica.

Decide I would like more Workers after all. The front is expanding and there is open land; I am using all the Workers on the front line rather than having 200 for improvments. Also only Egypt has rails. Switch appropriate Settler builds to build some next turn (we only have 543 - how are we to survive?) It is fairly easy to find 50 cities to switch over.

Moving Abandon 06 again and we can take out Leptis Minor, Rusaddir, and Theveste

We can reach Oea so it is Captured

Move Abandon 07 and capture Sabratha. I move it to the end of the Peninsula to place units next to Nora for next turn. Then it is moved back to get closer to Leptis Magna and Capture it

Move Abandon 03 to get over the mountains for Sulcis next turn (surrounded by hills) and Abandon 09 to get to Gadir. Move it again to get to Hippo Regius and capture it.

We can capture rusicade after moving Abandon 04. This leaves 3 cities. The capitol is far away past India. Nora and Sulcis we will try to capture next turn.

We also build the city 'Turkish Blood Bath' on their borders. Not that they should be nervous or anything....

IBT: We had a landing from Canada and from India. No real attacks to mention on the front lines.

1843 AD: For Canada we capture Gatineau and Surrey moving Abandon 01 to do so. Surrey has a Motorized Settler. We attempt the Capital (moving Abandon 02) but they have a boat Settler.

We capture the Spanish City of Asturias and Indian town of Dacca (using Abandon 03)

Build Mountain Fortress and use a Great Artist to Grab 'no man's Land' that is being used to reach us.

Also (later) build Grey Hills to Grab more mountains With most under our control we will not need to fight as many units in them.

We attempt to kill off Israel:



And then Greece:



My plan to take all the North will not occur with Canada not killable. This makes India lesss attractive. Arabia, Turkey, Persia, and Austria are all on our borders. Persia declared war on us sight unseen, so while not the best in terms of 'front line', they win the 'most righteous smiting' award. The other civ we are at war with; Austria is a contender has an annoying Jungle and Swamp to get past, so is not the best for a last turn.



Gathered units near capitol so I can find them.

So Persia:
Our attack is already lined up on Bactra which we capture.

Move Abandon 07 and then Capture Ghulman, Gordium, and Istakhr.

Move Abandon 08 to Capture borazjan. We can also capture Sidon

Stepping past some Swamp, we are able to move Abandon 01 to Capture the capital Persepolis.

Clean up units next to and in our borders. Our lawyers fail this turn but we get a Monk.

Move Abandon 03. That gets us to Tyre.

Using a Monk on Abandon 01 allows us to capture Antioch.

Moving Abandon 04 gets us Pasargadae
Abandon 09 gets us Arbela
Ababdib 10 gets us Ergili




Notes:
I liked the 'Abandon 01-10 idea'; they occur first in the shift-L list of city names and I can just move to them by finding an old one and disbanding to rebuild it somewhere else. (10 are not actually needed - maybe 01-05?). Its not actually my idea; I saw cities named this when I used shift-L and found it useful.

We ran out of Workers first. There are a few units near the capital and not all is roaded. There was a lot of open spaces this turn. This is in spite of building forty last IBT. 583 seems enough though...

We have dropped to 35 settlers; they no longer extend more than one page. We have 73k gold after taking out Israel and will get 20k more if we can kill Canada.

The best guess for Canada settler is this Ship. There are 3 visible stacks; one just landed and another I killed the transport but it didn't help. Or it could be somewhere unknown...



Canada, Nubia, and Carthage are all down to just their Capital.

We own 53% land with us taking a lot of space this last 10 turns. We are near the end.