[BNW] NEW Community Challenge Game series - Game 1 - Spain

[consentient]

Sacred Sites doesn't have spare time for embarked units...and you plant them as close as possible to each other for maximum effect. Anyway, that's going a bit off topic

 

[mbbcam]

I got to about Turn 280 and it was beginning to be a bit like the Battle of Britain (one air force against another) so I clearly wasn't sufficiently far ahead to win easily. Then my happiness tanked because I wasn't paying attention to things I ought to have been watching. Being a glutton for punishment (but not that much of a glutton) I thought I would go back to a save at Turn 115 and see if I could do better by heeding some of the excellent advice from our mentor, @consentient. It is early days, but I did manage to capture the next city much more quickly as a result of better unit positioning and better preparation. I've also managed to get the AIs fighting each other, which is good. I'll see if I can continue the good work. (When I've had a rest, as I've knackered myself!) Thank you, @consentient.

 

[consentient]

You're welcome. I just downloaded OB Studio and will make a video about starting war with CBs and going into detail about positioning. Just need the throat to heal.

 

[claudiupb]

I only just now realize that the Spanish conquistador does not have a penalty when attacking cities and I always wanted to do a domination using only fast units (it is quite fun with German panzers and I think it can also be with knights).

I am too far into this game to change my focus (I aimed for domination with CB/XB and maybe some naval in the end), and I will finish this one but if I have the time I can retry the map with this strategy in mind.

 

[claudiupb]

Managed to finish the game, at T200 with a Dom Victory.

Spoiler :

Start of the was game very fast, found the nearby two NW very fast and got 2 Settlers to settle them. Later on I made a settler of my own just to forward settle the Dutch. It was like I started at T -30 instead of T0
Since I already had the awesome start with 2 free settlers I went with Honor (right side then left) which made a pretty good combo with religion (One with Nature + Initiation Rites + Holy Warriors + Holy Order + Religious Center). The massive faith form pantheon allowed me to get a religion fast and buy Archers and Warriors. The Initiation Rites gave me 4-500 gold early game which was quite useful to upgrade my units especially since I had Professional Army from Honor. This allowed my production to focus on buildings, and I got Shrines + Temples early for even more faith + the happiness. Holy Order allowed me to easily spread my religion as I conquered and just rush buy my army on the spot instead of having to move my new troops from the core cities at the edge of the continent.
The game was pretty straight forward, and would have been easier if I had payed some attention to diplomacy. Instead I made an enemy out of everyone but I got lucky and the guys in the west kept busy without any interference so I managed to sweep them pretty fast.
After researching Construction, I invaded Russia and in the mean time I was buying a second army to attack the Dutch. The first army went for Morocco when done with Russia and then the two armies merged together to take the dutch since they were pretty tough to crack. By this time I had upgraded most of my army to Crossbows. Next I only attacked one civ at a time as I advanced west, with little resistance, and later I also started building a navy to take on Carthage.
It was quite a fun game and the map was fantasying providing some challenges to domination but overall being easy enough so it doesn't get frustrating.

 

[mbbcam]

Well done! You clearly actually know how to play the game! Thanks for the report -- I learned much more from it than you might expect.

 

[consentient]

I can't work out why OB Studio won't work. Whenever I press 'Start Recording', I'm getting errors. Can anyone help?

 

[beetle]

I am loving these early 200s wins. I retried from scratch, and am at war the whole game, but DOM is taking me well past T300 when the WL vote comes up. Southern neighbor built the Great Wall just as I was getting my CBs in position. So I went north first, which was almost as painful with the double deep hills and forests.

Since I already had the awesome start with 2 free settlers I went with Honor (right side then left) which made a pretty good combo with religion (One with Nature + Initiation Rites + Holy Warriors + Holy Order + Religious Center). The massive faith form pantheon allowed me to get a religion fast and buy Archers and Warriors. The Initiation Rites gave me 4-500 gold early game which was quite useful to upgrade my units especially since I had Professional Army from Honor. This allowed my production to focus on buildings, and I got Shrines + Temples early for even more faith + the happiness. Holy Order allowed me to easily spread my religion as I conquered and just rush buy my army on the spot instead of having to move my new troops from the core cities at the edge of the continent.

Thanks, this is a great script! I am looking forward to try and emulate it, sometime after next week.

 

[claudiupb]

I gave it another go this time focusing on Domination with Conquistadors. Finished at T187 but this time I had map knowledge and a little bit more focus.

Spoiler :

The early game was pretty much the same as the last one This time I only built two scouts and started on my settler earlier. And with religion I got mosques instead of +2 happiness from temples, and Itinerant Preachers so that I won't bother with actively spreading my religion. Also the city placement was a little different in order to grab more horses.

Once my religion was set up I started buying Chariot Archers and Horsemen to attack Moscow and Amsterdam. I was first attacked by the Russians and defended Barcelona with my army. After the first wave I was on the offense and quickly captured the capital and an expo. By the time I turned focus on Amsterdam they had the great wall so they had to wait.

Then I pretty much sat around while I beelined chivalry, extending my army so that I can upgrade to Conquistadors as soon as I hit chivalry. Once this happened went for Morocco, then Denmark and Maya. Because the Conquistadors have 4 movement, things happened pretty fast. In order for great generals to keep up with the army I usually sent one to hang around the borders of my next victim. So while I was waiting for chivalry I sent great generals to Morocco border, while fighting Morocco sent one to the Danes, etc.

Meanwhile I managed to build Alhambra in Madrid and started to buy conquistadors there to handle the Dutch. After fighting the Maya, the conquistadors began to become outdated. It was still easy to capture expos but capitals were a little too strong. I used one XB to help capture Amsterdam, but with Carthage I was in trouble. I managed to capture some expos but the terrain in that peninsula was making it very difficult to get in. So I focused north on getting the Iroqouis capital since they were pretty weak after fighting both Cartage and Maya. Then I got a bit of luck and Carthage offered a peace deal with two cities that were right next to the capital. Took it and used the 10 turns to bring all my army there and then the moment the deal expired I stormed the capital in a Kamikaze attack with my Conquistadors.

I have to say I find this type of warfare more fun then using range units. You have more upgrade options and the strategy is a little different. Too bad that most horse units have a penalty for cities and you can only do this with a few civs.

 

[aafritz17]

Wow, did THAT take me forever! T349 SciVic.

Spoiler This uses Civ names! :

Started with a culture-vic goal. But (dumb mistake) went Trad instead of Lib, and (more dumb) planted only two expos.
In early game Russia was a wonder-whore, while Carthage eradicated the Iroquois (so I never met him, but recognized his cities).

When Russia dropped a city in the middle of my 3 cities, I decided to go to war for a while (frigates, Xbows, and conquistadors). Took all her cities on the continent (most having Unis and Schools!), left her with one island city. Agreed with Willy to DOW Denmark, was able to take HIS capitol. (Actually, it was taken by Willy the turn before my ships got there, but Denmark won it back, which then gave me the opportunity.) Later I facilitated 2 or 3 DOWs on the Maya, and took his capitol with a bunch of tanks.

But I had relatively new DOFs with Morocco and Netherlands, and wasn't ready to turn on them yet. Carthage's army just grew and grew. I was fourth-largest military most of the game. I was first to ideologies, took Order hoping to just blend in. But, no, a couple took Autocracy, a couple others took Freedom, and pretty soon it began to hurt. I finally switched to Autocracy (with Carthage and Morocco), but still had some unhappy influence toward Freedom. That finally turned around when Carthage (with a lot of C/S allies) and I were able to ram-through World Ideology=Autocracy.

By then I realized I had the tech lead, and also had 10 or 12 GS sitting around. So let's do a SciVic, right? However, there is zero help in Autocracy for that, so ended up hard-building 1 part in Seville (bought a Spaceship factory, nuclear plant, and hydro plant, then starved the city until I could build the part in 10 turns), 2 parts in Madrid, and 3 in POWERHOUSE Moscow.

 

[consentient]

I eventually got around to finishing my sweep after being distracted by a lot of other crap going on in my life, including illness

T213 - Domination

Spoiler :

After Denmark, I took Maya with Cannons, then quickly moved to Dynamite and very quickly after that took out Iroquois, Carthage and Morocco (who had been my faithful friend and trading partner to the end). I could have done this quicker if I had been less cautious around Carthage and allowed to troops to be sacrificed but I wanted to practice not letting troops die, in prep for the Deity game which is coming up.

I really wanted to record parts of my game as tutorials for troop positioning but I couldn't get OB Studio to work yet. Very unintuitive software, I must say

 

[BlackWizard]

Is scrambled map pack required?

 

[stormtrooper412]

No, it is not

 

[penguin74]

Dom V turn 320.

Spoiler :

Not happy with the time it took. Made a few mistakes along the way. Settled the hill and then next to Sri Pada. Early culture ruin made me go tradition, but I wish I had gone liberty. Lots of places to expand. Ended up with 4 cities, 3rd on the cost south by the horses/cattle and 1 north by the marble. Stole a worker from William and 1 from a CS.
Went after William 1st, but Harold took Amsterdam, so I had to declare was on him instead. Morocco finished off William's last city right after I took it. Turned south to go after him and took 1 city before nearing his capital. Stupidly declared war on Russia before taking Marrakesh and ended up caught in the middle. Made peace with Ahmed to deal with Russia. Mistake # 2 was leaving Russia alone after taking Moscow/St Petersburg. She never threatened me again, but spammed so many cities it made troop movements take forever which added a good 30-40 turns.
Wanted to leave Carthage for last as we were friends the whole time and they were dominating the other half of the continent, but they had finished off the 8th civ before I met them, so I didn't know where to go to find the last capital. Eventually found Onandaga through open borders, so after taking Palenque and Copenhagen, sent everything I had at Dido.
Should have been able to do this in 250-260 turns, so I may try again.

 

[consentient]

Penguin were you building roads to march your troops West. How was your marching progress delayed so much?

I wouldnt worry about the time...I'm sure you'll be able to get it down lower and lower with more practice

 

[penguin74]

Unfortunately, didn't get to build roads. Russia's city spam cut me off. I probably should have gone back to war with them to clear a path, but most of the capitals left were coastal (never found Onandaga til after I went to war with Dido), so figured I could just clear with a navy and then send troops east through Dido's land. In hindsight, wasted alot of time. Live and learn

 

[YomoKimyata]

Domination 282. I'm not sure how to use the spoiler tags, so I'll just say, thanks, that was great and just about my speed. I got bogged down a bit and probably should have managed my science a lot better. Hit a few benchmarks that seemed pretty good to me (I'm generally an Emperor player), like Education by 110 and Artillery by 200 thanks to one of the fastest starts I've ever had. On a replay I'd hope to shave off at least 20 turns.

 

[raider980]

Started this last night, wish I'd have seen it a month ago but looks like some are still playing it so I'll gave it a go before trying the next one. Awesome map! I've never seen so much space. And that's one thing I dislike about Civ 5, everything is so crowded. I've never gotten 4 cities up so fast. I haven't even played 100 turns yet, have 4 cities with more great spots left.

Spoiler Beginning ~ T80 :

Found both NW and bought a settler to go settle the one to the southwest. Double faith got me to first Pantheon; picked the + faith for NW one. 16 FPT (plus 2 faith ruins) got me first religion and first GProphet to enhance before anyone else even had a religion.

I can't decide whether to attack Catherine or just let her alone and confine her to the south corner. I was going to try and take her out with CB or XB but she's being friendly and there's so much room I can expand to the northwest; including that long river with the floodplains where two cities can go. And I love exploring, expanding, building cities, that's why I still played Civ 2 until about a year ago.

Plus, I'm worried about Harold. Every game I've every been in with him he's attacked me. He's a warmonger, but not a cool warmonger like Shaka or Monte who you can be buddies with and attack the other civs.

And William, I didn't even find him until way late even though he is right next door. I circumnavigated his cities and met Harold and The Maya first. Then I sent a scout back home and ran right into him. That was a big surprise.

 

[Nybelung]

I managed a turn 315 Science Victory.

Spoiler :

Settled 6 cities with Liberty (Later went Explo and Rationalism) and took only Amsterdam with Conquistadors.
Later Hiawatha and Pacal went Order, I followed, and then Catherine and Dido followed as well. I wasn't focused on making the fastest SciVic, I thought there would be war with Catherine so I made detours to Frigates, and later to Artillery but ended not using them.

 

[Grendeldef]

Woot, Consentient is back and even with a new series - I really should check the forums more often these days.
Anyway, looks like an excellent opportunity to do some comeback gaming with this and the Beetle's series. Cheers to both OPs.