LK156, Spain, CCM 2.0

[LKendter]

To keep the first CCM V2 game simple, I chose Pangaea, 60% water. The civ was still totally random.

As typical, I roll absurd starts before the real game. I had all tundra, massive desert range and 1 grassland surrounded by hills.

4000 BC (0)
Our initial tech choice is naval warfare. This is the only second tier tech we can go after.
(IT) We have completed worker houses. With the changes in CCM, this is the very first item you build.

3600 BC (8)
It seems awful early to find a slow AI unit. We have contact with Rome. We can't pull off any trades.

3050 BC (19)
We have another contact - the Inca. We also have contact with Persia.
We ship sail to Persia for masonry and $4.
We ship sail and $28 to Inca for pottery.
We ship sail and $72 to Rome for warrior code. We have $1 left in the bank. It was worth it to get a nice chunk value from a starting tech.

2900 BC (22)
We meet the Dutch. No trades are possible.

2850 BC (23)
We meet the France. No trades are possible.

2750 BC (25)
Barcelona is founded. It doesn't have any food, but we grab that block of dyes very close to Italy.


(IT) The Dutch complete the Colossus.
I thought scouts were immune to attack per the Civlopedia. It is wrong - I watched a scout die to something invisible.

 

[LKendter]

2580 BC (30)
(IT) We complete Slaver's Hut.

2500 BC (32)
(IT) We lost our other scout next to unknown borders.

2140 BC (40)
We have contact with China, but no trades are possible.

2060 BC (42)
Our brand new slaver goes hunting. We kill a Chinese archer, and go elite.

2020 BC (43)
Seville is founded.
Our exploring ships pay off. We have contact with Brazil.

1980 BC (44)
Brazil has a crappy tundra city, and is a lot more backwards. They may be a key to help recover the tech hole.

1900 BC (46)
Brazil has workers mining forest? I didn't know that was possible. Is this a CCM2 change?

1780 BC (49)
We have contact with Scandinavia.

 

[LKendter]

1740 BC (50)
I give naval warfare to Scandinavia for polytheism, the wheel, and $138.
Persia is a dud, and has no interests in naval warfare.
I give naval warfare to France for iron working and $3.
China gives the best price for writing - naval warfare and $65.
I hate buying government techs. I ship iron working, writing and naval warfare to Brazil for city-state and $63.
I give the Dutch naval warfare and $121 for math.
I give Italy naval warfare for mysticism and $59. We know Italy has betrayed our Persian friends. Wow, we had a war already.
That insane trading session caught us up except for riding owned by just 2 civs. There are still civs needing math and naval warfare.

This is an overview of our civ. You can see all the ugly tundra to the south. We are clearly by the South Pole.

 

[LKendter]

The next proposed city. We can't fully see that area. What we can see the critical iron, and more wines.

 

[LKendter]

You can see Persia will be boxing us in from the other side soon enough.

 

[LKendter]

Summary:
This is an overall ugly start. We did well in the luxury category.
Food is terrible. We have a single wheat tile for the capitol. Barcelona has no food - I had to grab those dyes ASAP. I had to overlap Seville a bit with Barcelona to get the cattle under the stack into use.

We are down to 2 exploring land units. They are the warrior heading south, and the spear next to the mountain. We need to hope our ships do better, and find more civs.

I don't know if it is an effect of CCM2 as a scenario, but the AI civs are absurdly large already. I deleted the second settler we got from staring as a scenario to make it like a typical game. I hope the AIs didn't get 3 cities.

ROSTER:
LKendter
Greebley (up)
Northern Pike (on deck) tentative - may move further until game known working.
Jersey Joe
TheRat
Elephantium

 

[ThERat]

Checking in

Now, that we have City States, are we going to revolt? In my test game I found it to be a much better government than despotism. Worker efficiency and much higher unit support.

 

[Elephantium]

It looks like the AI civs got 3 Settlers to start. All the civs show 3-4 cities built in the diplomacy screen, plus capital = 4-5 cities. I'd expect the last few to hit 5 cities within the next few turns (unless they're having a start-of-game war?)

This start is BRUTAL for food. This isn't a succession game, this is a famine game!

I'm in favor of City State. The sooner we're out of Despotism, the better!

 

[ThERat]

In my few test games, I could not compete with the AI on lower difficulties until I started to switch out of despotism. Killing the starting settler increased the difficulty to SID

 

[Civinator]

Warning! The betatest files are in a very early stage of the test and I cannot guarantee the stability of your game, but of course I wish all players good luck!

Here are my comments to some of the statements above:

1. "I deleted the second settler we got from starting as a scenario to make it like a typical game. I hope the AIs didn't get 3 cities."

When playing CCM2 only as a scenario and you want to start with only one settler, you have to reset the 31 players settings to 1 (31 resets) - and you don´t have to use the Firaxis editor 1.03 as this takes out the option to receive scientific great leaders by a bug in that editor.

2. "This start is BRUTAL for food. This isn't a succession game, this is a famine game! "
"You can see all the ugly tundra to the south."

It is not so bad. In CCM 2 even tundra files can be irrigated - and there are a lot of berries in your screenshot, providing additional food.

3. "We have completed worker houses. With the changes in CCM, this is the very first item you build."

This was a good decision.Here the starting tactics had to be changed. In CCM 1 it was the best tactics to build this SW in the second city to have another city producing veteran units. As the epic game allows only 1 settler at the start, this had to bechanged to assure, that the autoproduced workers arrive as early as possible to strenghten the infrastructure of all civs.

4. "I thought scouts were immune to attack per the Civlopedia. It is wrong - I watched a scout die to something invisible."

That entry is not completely right as it is still the standard C3C entry. In CCM 2 there exist several scout units linked to different techs. You can only capture an unit if you have that tech, otherwise the unit is destroyed. This is what happened here.
.

 

[LKendter]

1. "I deleted the second settler we got from starting as a scenario to make it like a typical game. I hope the AIs didn't get 3 cities."
When playing CCM2 only as a scenario and you want to start with only one settler, you have to reset the 31 players settings to 1 (31 resets) - and you don´t have to use the Firaxis editor 1.03 as this takes out the option to receive scientific great leaders by a bug in that editor.

I didn't realize the AI was going to get extra settlers. We are playing closer to Sid level in my opinion. Okay guys, before we proceed further I want a vote. Restart the game using the 2 settlers?

 

[Civinator]

This is the setting, that must be changed for each single civ (31) if you want to play CCM2 as a scenario with only one settler. The players settings in the scenariosproperties doesn´t work in the epic game, so here each civ has the starting settler from the general settings ... and use editor 1.00 for it.

 

[Elephantium]

Let's try it! The worst that can happen is that we get crushed by weight of numbers in the first war -- always a concern with early war at high levels. OTOH, the extra Settler doesn't make the AS any less stupid, so we'll do fine if we manage any gains in the first war.

 

[Jersey Joe]

Lets Play on. If another change in the Conquest.biq occurs we could restart then.

We should be testing new features. I vote for changing into City States.

 

[ThERat]

Yes, please continue on....

 

[LKendter]

ROSTER:
LKendter
Greebley (up) <<< waiting for a got it.
Northern Pike (on deck) tentative - may move further until game known working.
Jersey Joe
TheRat
Elephantium

 

[Greebley]

Ok, I got it. Will switch govts. I am fine with continuing. Getting an extra settler is much less powerful when you can't build more. They will remain only one city ahead which is not what happens in a regular civ sid game.

 

[Greebley]

Loaded and looked over the game, but will play tomorrow or Saturday if anyone has more suggestions.
The area with berries and 3 fish looks pretty decent despite it being Tundra.

I will revolt before hitting enter. I assume it is still 2 turn revolts.

I did not follow why you now want worker housing in the capitol. Doesn't it allow for vets just like the palace does? At least that what the civopedia says; did I miss a comment that it has changed?

 

[Civinator]

Loaded and looked over the game, but will play tomorrow or Saturday if anyone has more suggestions.
The area with berries and 3 fish looks pretty decent despite it being Tundra.

Yes, it does.

I will revolt before hitting enter. I assume it is still 2 turn revolts.

So it is.

I did not follow why you now want worker housing in the capitol. Doesn't it allow for vets just like the palace does? At least that what the civopedia says; did I miss a comment that it has changed?

Worker houses are the only option to receive workers by autoproduction. They should be built as soon as possible. In the epic game all civs start with only one settler, as the players setting in the scenario properties (that give 2 settlers when playing CCM2 as a scenario) are not working when playing the epic game. If it´s built in a second city you will receive a settler for the second city 20 turns later, than that settler must be drawn to a tile to found a city, than one additional turn for building the SW and several additional turns until the first worker is autoproduced. This means all civs couldn´t build up any infrastructure for a long time.

So I set the palace as a perequisite for the SW worker houses and used all methods possible that the AI should build that SW first (but not all AI civs are always convinced to do so). The civilopedia entry still is the old one and must be changed. This comes on the To-Do-List.

 

[Greebley]

Preturn: Revolt

Royal Stables and Siege Workshop are possible.

1700 BC: Visiting other leaders generates a second or less of a static noise and then silence.
We spotted a Lowlands ship from the Dutch

1660 BC: We are now a City State. Switched to Construction which costs more - it is 50 turns either way.

IBT: Hinduism is founded in Bombay

Decide on Royal Stables for the Capitol. The Siege Workshop makes vet units and seems better in another city.

1580 BC IBT: Invisible unit kills the Worker that was with one of our Enslavers.

1540 BC: Attack square we were attacked from and we kill one of their Enslavers which we can't see. This gives us a worker (Italian)

IBT: We get attacked again (our other Enslaver warrior pair and lose the Enslaver.

1500 BC: Warrior attacks invisible unit and kill it. We also kill a Roman Archer and go Elite with the other Enslaver.
Both Enslavers seem Roman so they should be out of Enslavers until we get the next ones.
Lowlands has Trade but they "doubt" all our gold and gpt for it

1460 BC: Spot Korea and trade Writing for 37 gold

IBT Persia has brought a second unit next to our Capitol. They may be planning an attack.

1420 BC: There are 2-fers out there but we can't afford anything but riding. We are getting close with everything but lux sold.

IBT: Persia moved away. I refused to pay France 43 gold. I thought they might be bluffing but they declare war. They are pretty far away. Hopefully we can get peace before they arrive. I hope this doesn't get us in trouble; we probably want some more Spear.

1380 BC: Our Elite Enslaver gets a leader with our first elite attack. Seige Workshop can now go anywhere with the leader. Not quite as good as regular civ since no armies, but still nice.
This is the 10th turn and I will stop so we can discuss where the leader should go. I also didn't move the settler yet.

France declaring lowers our Lux rate by 10%. I think the save has this, but double check.