Marsden's HoF Attempts

[Marsden]

Well, it's a week later. I haven't seen my disk for a while now. On the plus side, the update is tomorrow, and my last game will be published, I'll get my M and I'll be one away from QM status. I just don't know when that one game will happen. I had a really difficult time on deity, but switching to emperor doesn't seem to be to bad of a challenge now, so I guess I've improved. Just one away from the O and the QM.

 

[Marsden]

Yes! I'm back once again! And I have conquests, too!

And I just had one of the strangest civ3 games I've ever played. I was on demigod, tiny two opponents. They did not attack me once. I just sat there, trying to build my civ like a peaceful builder, actually was close to catching up to the leader in tech, and the game ends with a culture loss. Oh, well. It really doesn't look like I'll be a QM any time soon, but I'm still trying.

 

[Tone]

It's annoying when that happens. I try to check F8 every so often as conquests kindly tells you who is the culture leader for 100K and 20K victories. Dianthus' CRpMapStat also tells you the total culture and cpt is for each civ but sometimes you get so wrapped up in your part of the game that you can end up forgetting to look at what the AI might be up to.

Good luck next time.

 

[Marsden]

Well, chugging along, trying for the QM. Based on advice of zerksees and others I am trying a tiny world again. Last time I took arch and when I thought about attacking someone I did not bother as I am not a fan of naval invasions. Maybe this is one of the many reasons I'm a regular player and not a veteran or elite, probably so. I am on a pangea with three opponents. I picked the extra competion to try to prevent a runaway enemy as my last attempt. I chose Babylonians because I did not want to be out cultured. I had the most incredible start position, that I knew if I didn't win this one, I am quitting. I have a wheat on grass just north of me and 2! cows (didn't see the 2nd until I moved the worker onto the first) on grass just south of me, plus a one tile lake and a river by the cows.

Well it wasn't long before the French started encroaching on my sphere of influence. I am still mad from last game. The french are to my west, Korea to my south, England somewhere, but on a pangea they will be around. About 2000BC I had filled my area with a dense city placement scheme, having more cities than any of my opponents. The Koreans are the strongest enemy. The English sent a settler through my territory and settled in a small peninsula to the north, the only part I hadn't filled in myself. I was expecting it to come to me as a culture conversion because I am trying to obtain the 100k VC.

Well, expectations don't count for much. The English have only 6 cities. They are behind everyone, including me, but the decided they could take me and attacked me. I was primarily building temples and libraries, with some bowmen in cities that had both. I was afraid to go to republic because I haven't discovered how to keep my army small but still not be weak. I am in Monarchy, and will probably stay for some time. I asked the French for MA against England, which they were willing for half my money (352g). A good deal especially because all attacking English must walk through French territory or ship in. Luckily, I have iron and horses, actually managing to take a 2nd iron(at the time I though this was Korea's only iron, there was another just 5 tiles away.) England started the war by capturing a newly founded town, I recaimed it and took their town, filling in my section. I have 32% of the land now.

I built my army, crawled into the Middle ages, and got Fuedalism as my free tech, switched to producing morning stars and noticed Korea was pulling ahead on everything. They haven't gotten involved in any wars, although they have threatened me, the tribute was cheap and we have good relations. I plan on killing them. I have no patience to win by peaceful means.

The war with England ended and I saw my chance to hurt someone, so I betrayed my ally and attacked, giving them fair warning before entering their territory. The English, although furious with me, agreed to an alliance. I really wanted to hit Korea, but I was average strength to them, strong against France and England. I was planning at first to only chop France off at a natural chokepoint, taking 4 of their 9 cities including their iron and saltpeter. My plan worked fairly well, but they got the Templars, which did not require iron, so I still had an enemy with good attackers, so I continued on to the English border conquering all French cities. France was also nice enough to provide me with the Pyramids and Leo's. During this I started trading lux. with Korea and we maintained good relations.

Around 500BC I have a Strong army vs England, on the English border, they have 6 cities total, having founded on a one space island of the nw corner of the continent. I am average against Korea and they have passed me on culture. I covet their great library, and I am afraid they will attack while I'm attacking England. England, while small, has muskets, and that would take a long time for my men-at-arms and trebuckets to beat. I decide on an all out assault on Seoul. I have metallurgy and and am going for Mil. Trad. while my army comes back. I intend to mass upgrade my bombardment capability. I move a big stack of cannons, cavalry, and mid inf. toward Korea. I notice that their only source of saltpeter is just outside the capital and I plan to deny it from them. They will use up what cavalry they have and I'll see longbowmen. Wrong. They had repl parts and I didn't know as I was yet to discover theology. Well, I am Not used to conquests. I asked for a RoP, which was happily given, and moved my SoD onto the hill of saltpeter next to the Korean capital. I was now weak against Korea, I know I should have prepared better. I attacked, he had 10 riflemen but my cannon and macemen beat him, I reserved my cavalry as I thought they could pick off his longbow counter-attack. I got to the IA and got Nationalism, com. and Facsism. I thought I'd get Steam, but no. Then it I realized I was mistaken, all these guerillas pop up and I'm in trouble. I was scared I was going to lose my whole campaign force so I abandoned Seoul, moved my whole stack to my closest town and gave it away to England. All of those recent posts by sanabas teleporting troops sounded like a good idea. I lost 2 small towns, he lost his capital. I asked England for help and they agreed for iron. The Koreans promtly took the town I gave away, further helping England to stay in the war. I have to say, the English really bailed me out. They commited enough troops to keep the Koreans from advancing into my territory, and I realised I had some capabilities I wasn't taking advantage of, so I switched to Facsism and Mobilized, plus I drafted a bunch of troops. I figured a conscript rifleman is better than a regular bowman. Well, despite my foolishness, I was able to turn things around and by 1400AD the Koreans only had 3 cities and were in big trouble. By 1450 Korea only has it's one island city. I asked for peace, and redistributed my army, mostly to the English border. I expected England to be a problem and they were. They demanded gems, and I just didn't want to give them away, so they attacked. This war has been one of silliness mostly. They send a stack of infantry, I shell them, they run away. Or they send 3 frigates and a transport and drop of 1 or 2 guys which I shell and kill. The last few times I shelled the ships and they turned and ran. I am producing about 300 culture per turn, which will give me 60k in about 100 turns. I realise this is not very impressive, but I'm somewhat pleased. Unless some strange thing happens I will submit this and fullfill the requirements for QM. I estimate the ending date at 1700AD.

Wrong again, it ended in 1948. I was expecting to just let the culture build up, but England suddenly started producing quite a bit of culture. I ended up at 83k before I won. And, the English didn't want to live in peace, they declared war on me, so I destroyed all of their new cities and most of their core cities except for 2. I really appreciate the bombers more, now. Also I have a new view of armies, I had a calvary army with 4 units and it was more powerful than my tanks. I also like the craters that the artillery cause, now blasting a resource causes more of a delay than just relaying the road.


Start postition and ending minimap attached

 

[Bartleby]

England somewhere, but on a pangea they will be around.

Not necessarily; if your domination limit is high, the English may be offshore.

 

[sanabas]

I chose Babylonians because I did not want to be out cultured. I had the most incredible start position, that I knew if I didn't win this one, I am quitting. I have a wheat on grass just north of me and 2! cows (didn't see the 2nd until I moved the worker onto the first) on grass just south of me, plus a one tile lake and a river by the cows.

How are you planning to win? As in, which VC, and what's the general plan of attack? 20k? Maintain parity until you get tanks, then conquest? Maintain parity, ensure you build UN, and win the vote?

Personally I think if you're trying to beat a level you haven't been able to before, a coherent plan of what you want to do is more important than a really good start. A reasonable starting location and a good plan of attack is more likely to produce a win than an awesome start and not having direction in your playing.

 

[Marsden]

Personally I think if you're trying to beat a level you haven't been able to before, a coherent plan of what you want to do is more important than a really good start. A reasonable starting location and a good plan of attack is more likely to produce a win than an awesome start and not having direction in your playing.

You summed up my shortcommings very well. I never had a plan before I started with the HoF and I still have a hard time getting or sticking to one now. I'm sorry I didn't continue farther, I prefer to tell the whole game in one post by editing more info later than posting subsequent details. I will be very shortly adding more. One thing, please believe me your comments are very welcome, I am interested to hear from anyone interested in commenting, thanks.

 

[Marsden]

My next game I'm intending on having some fun crushing 15 random opponents. I took Germany, looking forward to trying those Panzers. I have ivory in my capital's radius to start so I'm going to build Zeus and then concentrate on settlers and workers, letting the statue build my army for me.

I expanded kind of slowly, not the best begining, but good enough for regent. I found that rather than having a very good start every time and doing every thing perfect every time is not that much fun for me. I don't intentionally try to do poorly, but its not fun if it turns into work. Not having x amount of cities by this date or this many techs by this date is not the most important thing. Of course, I'd have to change my tune quite a bit if the HoF was actually full. I doubt any of my games would qualify.

I started almost in the center of a pangea. I decided my overall stratagy would be to expand in one direction until I hit the opposite coast and then fill in one side and then the other. To my dismay I had neither horses or iron. My weak Indian neighboor had both so I attacked. After consolidating his territory I found the Zulus to be cramping my plans for expansion by settler so I struck them next, asking England for an alliance. After dispatching Shaka, I turned on England, asking Sumeria for alliance against them. England didn't have iron, so they couldn't fight very long. I then hit Russia, again with Sumerian help. Russia had iron, but no saltpeter, so they went pretty quick. I had a lovely army of four ancient calvary that had 23 hit points. They became obselete quickly but were very mobile and could crack a hard defender, but I didn't dare use them against a strong point after the enemy had riflemen. The were excellent at razing enemy improvements event during the age of modern armor however, having three movement and free razing. After the Russians, the last on the far end of the land mass was the Dutch. I miscalculated a bit here, because I saw that William had no saltpeter, but I forgot he doesn't need it with his Swiss. My cavalry still dispatched him without much trouble. I now had the Sumerians bracketed on 3 sides, and absorbed their kingdom as well. I now owned about half of the world, from the west end across the north. Bringing my troops home I was attacked by Japan. We did not share a border, so I had to cross some territory to get them. I asked France to help me, and they fell quickly. I then planned another sweeping action going through the Aztecs, Romans and Spanish. The Iroquois attacked my Japanese holdings so it was me and France against China, Iroquois, and Hittites. Korea was backwards and puny. After Japan I mostly razed everything, having consolidated previous peoples into my empire. I did not want a domination but I keep the spanish city that had Smith's. After grinding the Iroquois into the dust, I killed off China and destroyed the Hittites. I then turned on France. After they were gone blowing the Koreans off the map was quick. I finished in 1824.

I think always going as fast as possible, besides being beyond my ability, also would eliminate several civs as good choices, Germany for one. Agricultural, Expansionist, and sometimes Seafaring are much more important when trying for early victories. Look at the civs tab on the HoF http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ3/stats.php?show=civs. I like to try some civs that aren't the best choice necessarily, Maya is practically default for Hist.

 

[Marsden]

I picked England because there were no Histograpic games submitted that featured them, plus I wanted to try those new Man-O-War ships. They are improved, and I like getting the free ones, but still not really decisive. I did get good use out of them, though. I tried to do the standard plan of expand as much as possible, then conquer, and then just grow. Well, I never conquered as much as I was supposed to, and basically gave up after I had my whole land mass. I controlled about 40% of the land. I actually lost my first war when a German archer "sneaked" up to my city that had my silk and captured it. I got it back later due to culture but it really hurt my republic with WW, and I only had 2 Lux. After a brief peace I attacked again and absorbed Germany, then Persia and only had India on my land. They had no resources, I was lucky as I had iron and horses this time. I intended on attacking but we had a ROP and I was trying to maintain my reputation. Again I don't understand what makes sense the the AI but they attacked me. They got nowhere, but the new elephants were much more effective attacking my calvary than I thought they would, but as soon as I got my Infantry they were doomed. One nice thing, I sunk an Indian galley to trigger my golden age, although I built Smith's about 2 turns later, so I was there either way. After India was gone, I had a peaceful period, trying to work on markets and research. I somehow allowed myself to become "weak" militarily and the Byz. attacked me. They gained no ground, and it gave me a chance to remove the one city the managed to settle before I filled in all of India. I trashed a good portion of their core cities, I bombed one of their oldest cities from size 20 down to 3. I was going to take more of their territory but it became tedious and I was getting distracted from my goal. So, I signed a peace treaty. Shortly after, the Romans started to building the Spaceship. Well, we just could not allow that. Luckily I maintained my rep, and had a ROP with Rome. I signed a MPP with Byz, even tho' we just went at it about 50 years ago. I then subtely moved a stack of MBTs and MI with bomber and RA support to outside Rome. Right after they finished the seventh piece, I couldn't wait any longer and burned Rome to the ground. Bye bye spaceship. Mwahahaha! The Romans then unloaded their ICBMs on me. I have to say, even nukes suck if you don't use them correctly. It launch 8 or 9 on me, hit 3 different cities, all on the edges of my territories, I barely lost anything. I was expecting at least one to hit my capital, wreck my core, but nothing. The Byz then declared on them, too. Did most of my fighting in their territory, and since I was the Romans only source of oil, they were down to 3 MBTs and a tank when the war ended in 2007(?). I also took all existing Al, except for one the Byz had. One appeared however, about 2045 next to their capital, but it was too late.

My goal was 10,000 pts, which I missed, but I was kind of happy overall. I want to go again, same settings but change to pangea and take someone else. Maybe I can knock myself up a few more notches on the Hist table.

 

[Marsden]

This was a quick and easy one, I just expanded peacefully, built some nice buildings and was nice to everyone. I won the election. A lot of the AIs were really stunted, the Romans only had one city. But everyone voted for me except the other guy running. No involvment in any wars, lot of hitting enter.


Sorry, too scant on details. I had Byzantines, requested achapelago, moderate climate. I had good success with the curraghs early contact. I left the opponents on random. I remeber Babylon, Rome, Carthage, Maya on my island. Then Korea and England on the closest over. Another farther away had Greece Sumeria and Inca. There may have been one more, but I don't recall, sorry. I'm way behind on my posting as I played this over a month ago and I finished 3 more I haven't even posted yet.

Ending date was 1758, which is pretty good for me, but I know not to good.

 

[Tone]

Who did you play as, Marsden? (and who were your opponants?)

Final date?

 

[Marsden]

This is the "lost" game of post #3. I finally got my computer back from the store, and behold, after months of waiting I finished this in about 1/2 hour.

I took America, no in game reason, just wanted America. I didn't expand to well, and ended up owning a large corner on the southern edge of the world. Lots a penguins. Several small wars with neighboors no great conquest of territory. My best fighting was done by the Romans, who were again my ally. Ended in 1981. On the other continent, India destroyed almost everyone, they might of ended up winning if I let it go to 2050.


The thing that really stands out for me about this submission was the time involved between stopping an restart, about 4 months, and the differences that have occured since then. All I could remember was I was going for Spaceship and the Iroquois and Chinese were against me and the Romans. I loaded up and I couldn't believe how bad my army looked and how poor my infrastructure was. I can't believe 4 months ago I thought I had a good army. I guess I have improved, maybe. I know I wasn't very pleased with what I saw when I looked now, but then I remember thinking " I'm doing ok"

 

[sanabas]

The thing that really stands out for me about this submission was the time involved between stopping an restart, about 4 months, and the differences that have occured since then. All I could remember was I was going for Spaceship and the Iroquois and Chinese were against me and the Romans. I loaded up and I couldn't believe how bad my army looked and how poor my infrastructure was. I can't believe 4 months ago I thought I had a good army. I guess I have improved, maybe. I know I wasn't very pleased with what I saw when I looked now, but then I remember thinking " I'm doing ok"

Sounds like you've improved a lot. Play a game now with the same initial settings and opponents and you'll probably comprehensively beat your finish date.

 

[Tone]

I guess I have improved, maybe.

I would imagine there is no 'maybe' about it! It's scary when you look back at old games sometimes. As you say, at the time everything looks fine but with increased experience you spot glaring errors. Mine normally revolved around a distinct lack of workers.

 

[Marsden]

Thanks, sanabas and Tone. I know I'm not as "good" as some people, but I think I have progressed. I can beat Emperor. Above that I'm still shakey. Monarch and down I can do just about what I want, although I'm not fast enough to get the really good scores. Still, I have a lot of fun with this game, and the HoF gives me definite goals to shoot for. Without a goal I kind of wander and loose my advantage I might have.

 

[Marsden]

Hi again, I'm about 5 finished games short of posts and Zerkzees has a good point about Civ 4 so I'm going to make further entries more abbreviated. Of course, any information I could provide will be happily supplied. The main reason I post is to encourage conversation. I also like to list my entries.

 

[Marsden]

I took Sumeria, continents, all science opponents, trying specifically for spaceship. finished in 1852. I don't really know where I went wrong here. I just don't think 1852 is a good date for this level. And I played this in about one sitting while my wife was in the hospital recovering from surgery, so maybe thats why I can't remember a lot of details. I expanded ok, surrounded and almost absorbed my nearest neighboor, Germany, and grabbed some territory from the other nation on our continent, Byzantium. No wars. Just expand and build and research. I didn't try anything like gifting tech to get the free techs. The guys on the other continent were all crushed together, the 4 of them shared a smaller land mass. They fought amongst themselves. No one was close to building a ship but me.

 

[Marsden]

I took Korea, mostly to use someone different. I hadn't done a small map in a while and I like building the spaceship. Higher difficulty, smaller map, and I launched in 1852. Yes that's the same date as last one. I didn't even notice it was the same date until I'm posting this now. I played this one around the same time as the last one. I was neighbors with Germany again, but I didn't surround them as I didn't expand as fast and the land was shaped differently. But again, I had the Byzantines as the 3rd occupant of my continent. The others were again together on the other continent. This time, there was plenty of war, however. Byz attacked me unprovoked. Different weird alliances formed, and I ended up with my patent pending betray my weakend ally manuever and finished off Germany. After I had Bombers and Artillery I slowly ripped the Byzantine countryside apart. The Babylonians were my major ally on the other continent, Sumarians were destroyed as well. Babylon was tech leader but I focused on building my spaceship more than they, which built more wonders.

I found the Hwachaa to be extremly disappointing I thought they would be neat, but

 

[Marsden]

I took India, and used archapeligo. I have problems with 20k the most, this is only the second time I achieved that victory, the first submitted to the HoF previously. Before the HoF, I never realized this was a victory condition, I thought the cultural victory was the 100k only. Dispite my attempts to do so I didn't achieve the victory until 1914. The Maya and Inca were on bigger islands and they were the main powers in this one. I was weak most of the game, until towards the end, I had about all the culture I could get and was waiting to score the 20k. I didn't have a good expansion, and there were 3 powers with settlements on my island. I eventually absorbed them all, but only after some of them traded hands in the various wars I tried so hard to stay out of. Eventally as I said just before I had enough, built a navy and went after the bad guy, which was Spain. I was slowly destroying there northern quarter when word came of the victory, I would certainly have killed them eventually, being the rouge state, and facing a three front war. The Vikings were throtled by the Inca, but they retained a small island near their shared homeland, so I kept them as a small ally for most of the later game. I traded well with the Hittites, who were my source of coal. I had a lot of difficulty with resources, but I had rubber and oil. In the industrial age these are the only ones you really need, although iron and coal for railroads is important, after they are built, the resources are no longer as important. I'm sorry as I cannot remember what wonders I built and which I missed. I remeber I was not the culture leader, Spain and I think the Maya and Inca were ahead of me, but no one concentrated their culture as I did. I remember building my new favorite wonder, Smith's, and things started turning around for me cashflow wise as I build stock exchanges and commecial docks everywhere. With the addition of those the Smith's wonder is much better, and the Elephants were handy, considering my lack of horses, I got my golden age from one, but it didn't really propel me as much as if it could have if I was in a better position.

 

[Marsden]

This time I took the Celts going for quick domination on a huge world, took arid 80% water pangea. I picked no expansionist or agricultural opponents, but I made a major mistake of forgeting about UUs and allowed Carthage Greece and Rome in the pack. This undoubtedly slowed my expansion as Carthage and Greece were close neighboors. I built the pyramids and Temple of Artimis, Statue of Zeus, and Knights Templar, although my crusaders never made a difference. Besides those wonders I only built troops, mainly Gallics, and settlers and workers. I took them one at a time expanding as much as possible, impeded by dense jungle so much for arid, and attacking each neighboor in turn, maintaining good diplomacy with the remaining ones. I did get attacked once, but it was very helpful as it was my next target that broke a trade to attack me, a target that I had stacked about 25 attackers just outside the border. I made sure not to declare war on anyone with troops insided enemy territory. I didn't realise once I discovered fuedalism I lost the ability to build my gallics. Overall, ok but I would definetly change some settings before I started, like no strong defending UUs for the enemies and hope for less jungle.

I am thinking about doing that and taking Inca and turning on huts.