News: BOTM 16 First Spoiler - up to 500AD

[Niklas]

BOTM 16 First Spoiler

Reading Requirements

Stop! If you are participating in BOTM 16, then you MUST NOT read this thread unless EITHER

• You have reached at least 500 AD in your game, OR
• You have submitted your entry

Posting Restrictions

• Please do not discuss anything that happened after 500 AD,
• Please do not divulge your final result if that happened after 500 AD.
• Please do not discuss the location of resources that may not show up before 500 AD.

Where did you settle and why?
How did your expansion go?
When did you decide on your VC goal and what were your your priorities in developing your empire?
Did you build the Great Lighthouse or not, and did it help you?
Did you encounter any cross-dressing bugs?

Hope you've had fun so far!

 

[sleepingbear]

One small detail, don't you have to post the game starting save before opening the first spoiler thread?

 

[Niklas]

The starting saves are up already, and linked to from the pregame thread. Check this announcement.

 

[kcd_swede]

Where did you settle and why?
How did your expansion go?
When did you decide on your VC goal and what were your your priorities in developing your empire?
Did you build the Great Lighthouse or not, and did it help you?
Did you encounter any cross-dressing bugs?

Hope you've had fun so far!

Thanks Niklas for putting up a spoiler thread so quickly. It should improve the quality of my spoilers for sure. Actually, I was ready to end my session at 1AD, but noticed that the 500AD spoiler was up so finished that far just to be able to participate.

As for VC, I was/am thinking probably a miltary-enhanced space race, but would stay flexible enough to grab any victory that looks attainable along the way. Immortal is a bit above my comfort level, so any win at all will make me glad.

I was the devil's advocate regarding the GLH. However, the opening of sailing>mining>BW with the builds of WB>worker>lighthouse were in my plans anyhow. When BW revealed copper on the pig island, and there is no sign of any AI in the neigborhood, I felt pretty safe building the GLH without worrying about losing the metal. Actually, I'd say the AI expanded quite slowly in this game compared to my expectations.

GLH in 1840BC... one or two turns faster than I thought, probably because of corn available in BFC. (Settled in place). After the GLH, my goal was expansion. I probably should have gotten a granary in the capitol much sooner than I did, but I've gotten lots of settlers out to compensate. At 1AD I have 6 cities, and gotten marble, stone, copper, ivory, iron (x2) and wine hooked up, among other stuff.

At 500AD I have settled 1 more city and captured a barb city to the south (gain horses). London looks poorly defended.

The GLH did truly provide the powerful boost that all its admirers had anticipated. I skipped the Oracle. Tried to build Temple of Artemis in capitol... but missed by 6 turns. My first GP was a GM who was settled in capitol.

I have built GLib in capitol, and Moai Statues (with stone) in pig/copper city. Pyramids have been unclaimed so long I am making a half-hearted attempt to build them in pig city here ate 500AD.

After masonry I went wheel>writing>pottery?>alphabet>aesth>lit

I was first (among those I'd met) to reach alphabet, so that I went on a tech trading rampage. The Mad one still needed writing I picked up a lot of techs in trade. At 500AD I am in Hered Rule, Bureacracy, Caste Sys, nothing, and pagan. Have just finished compass and half way through machinery (at which point someone's getting maced). After getting Philo decided I probably could pick up astro as free tech for the Lib race. That's the plan, anyhow.

I have met 5 AI. Vicious, Crimson, The Mad, Sparrow, and the Cannibal. The one I haven't met is the only one with more land area than I have. I probably should just trade for a map... but I'm a miser with techs, usually. I did give one to the Mad guy to stop trading with Viscious, hoping to get some wars going. So far, there have been no wars. I am nobody's worst enemy, generally +2/+3 diplo with everyone, and start thinking I could try for some cheesy diplo win if things keep going. In that regard, I used an otherwise worthless GPro (hmm... where'd that come from? I must have built something else Wonderful I've since forgotten!) to bulb Theo and founded religion, with idea to build AP (with stone). However, I haven't dared run a state religion (yet), so I can't build the friggin thing anyhow. Maybe later (after I get my power curve up a bit), if nobody beats me to it.

I am at the top of the score table, and my GNP is competitive (a close 3rd or 4th), but my production is way far ahead of everyone else. Now... if I can only get those cities to grow. I am a little short on workers and dealing with logistical nightmare of shuttling them back and forth among islands. When machinery is done I will have a qualitative edge that should net me most of the British empire (just because they are the closest). They are still defending with archers, chariots, swords. Is this worth further delaying harbors? Hmmm... my city specialization needs some attention too.

If war goes well, I'll substantially increase my size, making a space race that much easier, but also aiding any diplo effort or anything else I want to do. I doubt I can win diplo without vassals, though. So space it is. Esp since the AI can't seem to make any hammers. Now I'll play without checking this thread again because I want suprise of finding out which AI who is hiding from me.

 

[smitsk00]

Started the game on the train from Seoul to Daegu, so no notes really - this is what I can recall. Settled in place. I dont recall the corn from the original screenshot. Was that a late addition, or was I just blind? Built WB, Worker, Lighthouse, GLH a few turns after 1800BC, then Granary(whip), Galley, Settler(whip), Warrior, Warrior, Settler(whip), Warrior, Settler, Library (whip), Forge, Trireme/WBoats while working 2 scientists and an engineer. By 1 AD, I had five cities, 6 by 500AD, 7 and 8 are forthcoming. AI didnt rex as well as expected. I should be able to get to 10 cities by Liberalism. I searched Sailing, MIning, BW, Masonry, Wheel, Pottery, MC, Machinery, CoL (no one would trade it -odd given test games), and am researching Civil Service at 500AD. I was able to bulb Currency(GM) and Philosophy(GS). My third Great Person is like 10 turns away. (I hope it is an engineer for Mining Inc.) I have forges/harbors up in about half my cities and one gun pump working hard. Moai should be up in the second shortly, and a third needs workshop bonuses. I am running my capital as a GPF at the moment, though after liberalism, it will switch to production. It looks like I have a very good chance of winning the Lib race (take Nationalism?). By that time, my goal is to have ten cities, trade quickly for Astronomy, draft out a pirate fleet and try to kill - or at least brutally maim - someone. If successful, I may continue the plunder, if not, maybe diplo or Space?? Given that this is my first real shot at Immortal, I could also just die horribly. BTW I like the touch on leader names! My military is all Axes and Crossbows at the moment, but Crossbows would be dominant right now, if I had more of them and if I didn't want to make sure that I got Liberalism first so that I can get Privateers out first to speed up GG's! Argh!

 

[PaulisKhan]

10-11 cities at 500AD, setting up my globe theater city (found a nice city with 3 fish+1clam that I'll whip the globe theater in. Once that is in place I'll simply whip myself an army while teching to astro and conquer enough of the world to race through to a space finish.
So many small islands the AI doesn't have much of a hope of putting up a fight. My tech rate isn't that spectacular, fed entirely by traderoutes.
Need to keep spamming settlers though, cheaper and faster than capturing cites later.

Have a Gmerchant sitting around, don't know what I'm going to do with him.

The funniest thing is that there have been 6 religions founded and each one by a different civ. I've never ever seen that happen before (guess who's not going to be adopting a religion in this game >.<)

 

[jdg23]

Am I the only one NOT receiving the bonus after having more than circumnavigated the globe? I dont get it, I have almost sailed around the globe 1 and 1/2 time but yet another civilization gets the bonus!?

 

[JerichoHill]

First off, I appreciate the renaming of our foes.

This is off of my memory. I settled on turn 3 to find out that I could only fit 1 city on my island. Niiiicee. But it's a good spot. I settler spammed early, and built TGL in my capital on turn 94. LATE! Couldn't believe it was not built by the AI. My Moai Statues were built on the island with the warrior on it. That will be a really nice location with Globe and a Dike later.

At 500 AD I'm running behind the CIVS but not by much. TGL is a HUGE advantage for me. I'm at the point where I can start brokering techs. I have two options for a VC at this point, Diplo or Space. I am militarily weak (warriors and archers), but I have Vicky and Joao as my friendly Confused Allies. Hannibal is the top Civ but with a different religion, so I have a good voting block if need be. I also have a pretty good scope of the land and at 500AD have the most land area. With Dikes, and my Moai city, I should win a peaceful space race.

I'm running Pacifism and have the NE in a southern city that's got 2 sea resources and is running 3 specialists and still growing, providing me 2 scientists for academies and 1 great merchant.

It is my speculation that I should be the top civ at 1000AD, and I appear well on the way to win the race to Liberalism, which if I get means that I will win this game (I have never lost an Immortal game when I got to Liberalism 1st.)

The main worry is my lack of military.

But I am Dutch. I will not fight. At all.

 

[VerbalKint]

Been away from the game a while, and never really like these absurdly small island maps, but I decided to give this BOTM a try.

I quickly realized the great lighthouse would be a nice support, so i teched for it, and started building it in 1440 BC, finishing it 900 BC. Thank god nobody else took it. It really took care of my economy, and I expanded to 4 islands other than the starting one, settling 5 cities in total, including Amsterdam.

Around this time I noticed Viccy was running around with archers - it seemed like she didn't have any iron or copper. I started to military up, pumping swordsmen while slowly teching to construction (picking up currency and calender along the way).
As soon as I had 2 catapults, I went for nottingham, and after some bombardments my swordsmen had 85,2% chance each. And I lost the first 2 I sent with those odds
Not a great morale boost, but I managed to take it, and move my way towards london (after a short wait, since i had forgotten to promote a medic)

London had a lot of culture and a wall, so I sat there for a while bombing away the culture bonus, while watching the other civs getting feudalism, crossing my fingers every time I hit "end turn" that she wouldn't get them before I got London. Viccys triremes also made reinforcements a bit tricky, but I maneuvered around them rather than trying to kill them.
Finally, on 500 AD exactly, I capture London in all its glory - Stonehenge, statue of zeus, Collosus(YAY!), the hindu religious building( with +9 gold ). What a booty!

Not sure what to do next though. It should only be a few turns before she has longbowmen, and I'm not really that close to macemen and trebs (lacking machinery), and I'm not even sure I can manage a military victory on Immortal.

Interesting game anyway, and more enjoyable than I thought it would be. Can't wait to see how Amsterdam will produce with Moai statues, a dike and bureaucracy

 

[Deckhand]

Where did you settle and why?
How did your expansion go?
When did you decide on your VC goal and what were your your priorities in developing your empire?
Did you build the Great Lighthouse or not, and did it help you?
Did you encounter any cross-dressing bugs?

Hope you've had fun so far!

IIRC
Settled in place. Lots of food, good production, moving to the hill would cost long term production and might be on top of a resource.
Vicious Vicky completed circumnaviation about turn 4.
2nd city, PigCopperPhants, founded on East Isle; 3rd city north b4 neighbor took it; 4th city too far north, to get iron;
Just before 500 AD, finally explored east enough to see

Spoiler :

stone and marble

will go there next

Spoiler :

considered settling the location that would get both, instead settled on Marble Island. Then Vicious Vicky builds a city that grabs the stone.

VC? I'm expecting an elimination or spaceship loss.
Built GLH sloppily, a few turns later than my dry run, straight path with warrior inserted. I think it is really helping. Vicky discovered Judaism, it spread to me and I converted. Oops, she is Hindu. No one likes me. So much for plan of adopting a popular religion and getting everyone pleased with me. I'm in trouble.

Nice map. The corn south of start was a nice surprise. Stone and marble available if I was luckier in explorations. Lots of places to settle after building GLH. (low sea level)
And I really appreciate the renaming of the pretenders.

 

[Deckhand]

Am I the only one NOT receiving the bonus after having more than circumnavigated the globe? I dont get it, I have almost sailed around the globe 1 and 1/2 time but yet another civilization gets the bonus!?

You need to circumnavigate both East/West and North/South on a toroidal map.

 

[SirDrake]

Where did you settle and why?

I settled on the starting island, because I had no boats.

In place. Getting on the plains hill would have been nice for a bit, but I get more hammers in the long run by turning that plains hill into a mine. Also, I saw an inland water tile that wouldn't have added anything useful to my capital.


How did your expansion go?

Warrior's island came second. I settled right atop the ivory. Smart? Stupid? You tell me. My goal, again, was to maximize hammers later, so I wanted to save the middle hill for a mine.

Sent a workboat southwest to explore. Death by barbarian.

Sent a galley further east of pig island and was approached by a barb galley. The Settler and Archer immediately jumped ship. Good move! The Galley was sunk. I settled on the eastern spur of that island, giving me access to marble and stone in the BFC. The resources will help, but the city has no food and will never amount to much. I settled a Great Merchant there. Smart? Stupid? You tell me. But the one extra food means my growth rate is effectively doubled.


When did you decide on your VC goal...

You think I can win? I've never played Immortal before, and have only recently tried out Emperor. On top of that, Normal speed is, for me, the equivalent of another 1.5 difficulty levels. Minus 0.5 for having the Dutch, and it still feels like Diety.

I'd've taken the Adventurer save, but I finished in the top half (21st) of BotM 14, which apparently means I have to man up and play it straight.


Where you dumb enough to adopt a state religion?

Yes, I converted to Hinduism, making for good relations with my nearest neighbors (Portugal and England). No doubt, though, some other Civ is on the verge of annihilating me for my heathen ways.


Okay, but surely you weren't dumb enough to start a war?

I was. I landed a Settler + Archer on the double-dye island in the southeast. The Greek had a Settler and a Worker. Having just landed, I could not Settle. Next turn, the Greeks have a city. I step outside the cultural border, wait a turn, and declare war. The undefended (!) city is razed two turns later by my archer. I added a free worker, made peace, and can now look forward to eternal enmity from Pericles. Or whatever his name is.


...and what were your your priorities in developing your empire?

* Grab any speck of land I can get before the AI. One defender per city, a warrior or archer. Very risky, but if I don't take the risk I haven't a prayer.

* Apply the Worker Rule ("you can never have too many") to Galleys, 'cause the map requires it.

* Leverage the Creative trait to compete with cross-channel AI cities for intermediate tiles. My second city on the home island (5th or 6th city overall, I was smart enough to wait) is at the extreme southeastern corner, where it can (eventually, I hope) work one of the English mines in its BFC.


Did you build the Great Lighthouse or not, and did it help you?

I followed the consensus advice in the pre-game thread and made it a priority. It is helping tremendously. Despite the lost time in expanding (it came before any Settlers), I have seven cities. Newly-built cities were producing 9 commerce from trade routes, which allowed me to delay Currency and CoL for some time.


I'll ask again: When did you decide on your VC goal?

I haven't yet. Any advice? Intermediately, I am thinking of building up some forces and trying to take over the English island. On the one hand, it is the best location for aggressive expansion. But on the other hand, the English (along with the Portugese) are the friendliest AI at the moment.


-J

 

[Mundungu]

After a long draught due to FFH, BOTM 16 managed to catch back my imagination.

A few test games and thouroughly reading the pre-game thread, I managed to achieve quite well in the early game, catching the Great lighthouse around turn 58. Hurray #1.

I had decided to build one more WB for exploration, trying to catch the "first to navigate the globe" which of course I failed.

I settled in place, and created my first steller only after finishing the GLH and a galley.

The new colony (utrecht) was build in the East, on the nearest Island, catching the copper. Later on I managed to catch the colossus in that particular city. Hurray #2

I remained last all the time in the standing, but was still feeling pretty good about myself. Time to REX !

And then as Usual things did not go as well as expected. I went right further east, to secure the Iron there (forgetting that I would have to build a fort, and could not mine it. Doh! #1. Well at least it got me some stone (Rotterdam).

Next target was to try catch the wine (the Hague) (ragnar was nice enough to trade Monarchy to me later on...) and stop the portugese expansion to the west. For what in gosds name reason I thought this would be a nice production city, and went building forge before a lighthouse... a millenium later, still population 1 ... go figure .. Doh! #2.

Latest in my REX was to secure my "home continent" (Nijmegen). Only at this time, there were no more workers on the home base, and It took me for ever to get Calender through trading. Doh! # 3.

Next attempts for expansions are a settler on the way north for one more city, and building up some axemen and swordsmen to take the Barbarian city in the south with the horse resource.

Other failures : Missed GL (maybe not so bad, got good cash), missed the first to discover Music by 3 turns (you will pay for this sooner or later, fish and chips eaters..).

Until early ADs I was confident to be able to remain not too far in the tech lead, but now a couple of AIs are getting far ahead....

Status 500 AD :
- Expansion : 5 cities, 2 of which underperformer (I guess my biggest mistake in the game so far), barbarian city should be able to fall in the next 20 turns (1 sword, a couple of axmen and one catapult gathering up)

- REsearch 1 turn away from CS which I hope will give me some boost. Liberalism seems out of reach... back filled most of the techs, could reseach next drama, engineering, Compass, Machinery and some others. Slowly loosing ground on the tech front.

- Military : no wars so far ! trying to backfill the military defficit to make sure my civilization becomes an easy prey to my neighbours, building up a small force to take on the barbars. All direct neighbours popped up some longbowmen, so that look NG for some preventive, surgical strikes until ate least Maecs come along.

- Politics : always my weak point, well not too bad. Only greece in the negative. But so far no wars between anybody ! Will I become the spark in the powder Keg ?

- Religion : got a religion in my capital, lucky for keeping the peasants happy. Followed the advice not to choose any religion so far. Let see where that takes us. 4 different religions in 6 of the AIs ...

- Financial : oh sweet GLH, running 70/30 with 92 LBs and only 4 defficit a turn with 172 reserve. Feeling safe there so far.

- GPs : Got a Merchant thanks to GLH, trying to get a scientist to create the academy in the capital.

- Goverment : The Rule and slavery ... all others still original.

Victory condition choice ?
Welllllll, first goal was to survive. Check !
Second thinking was : if I can get music first, I will try to get a shot at cultural. Doh ! missd it. Only chance would now be to change to Code of laws ... should I ?

Domination / Conquest : no more chance, waited too long.
Spaceship ? look likely that some other civ will achieve cultural first.

So what do I have that speaks for me ? most like me, but I am not good at the political game ... But I must choose... What to do how what to do ?

Anyhow, bottom line is my play level is normally Monarch with almost exclusively domination wins, and I would welcome any advise on where should I go from here ...

----------
BTW a prctical question, I made a few screenshots, how can I insert them ??? thanks a bunch.

 

[Lanstro]

I usually play immortal on bigs & smalls (and usually lose), so the pathetic performance of the AI on archipeligo came as a nice shock to me. Not often that you get to lead the score for most of an immortal game!

I moved the settler 1s onto the plains/hill since I didn't think I'd need that much food in the capital. That revealed the corn, and settling on the PH square on turn 2 was an easy choice.

I started building a warrior, but soon switched to workboat when my borders expanded and I realised how small the starting island was. Tech research went mining -> BW -> sailing. Build order was workboat -> worker -> workboat -> finish off the warrior -> galley -> settler -> workboat (for first expansion) -> settler.

The galley went and checked out the island directly south. I liked the look of fish + 3 hills, and I figured there was no danger in losing the bronze/ivory/pig island, so i settled there first. Second settler took the bronze/pigs/ivory town, settling to the south of the ivory. If I'd known that iron would pop up on the island to the east of it, I'd have settled on the ivory.

The capital then built towards the GLH, while the expansions built granaries, galleys and workers. With two hills, the bonus hammer from the center square and 2 workers rostered on as citizen specialists, GLH finished around 850 BC, and my 2 expansions were both about 4 pop by then. I built settlers in all 3 cities and and settled 1 on the marble island to the east (near the Greeks), 1 on the crabs + iron island to the south, and 1 on the fish + clams island to the west. The GLH easily financed all this, and by 500 AD i had settled another 2 cities to bring the total to 8.

Diplomatically, Carthage and England are warring each other, and the Vikings are warring the Koreans. I therefore am not trading with England or the Vikings. I didn't adopt any state religions and plan on hitting up free religion asap.

I got alphabet second out of everyone, but it was still early enough to broker all the main techs around, and soon I found that I was the tech lead. I also got the Great Library, so tech research is not a problem. I didn't go for any other wonders and concentrated on acquiring happiness resources/techs to grow my cities as much as possible. At 500 AD, I'm in possibly the strongest position I've ever been in an immortal game at 500 AD. With the immensely powerful dikes still to come, only a screw-up can prevent a win. I'm planning on winning by military means (or military-assisted diplomatic win), and plan on warring in industrial. I figure with dikes driving my production and a slight tech lead, the AIs will have no chance. I'm only building token military for now, to maintain sufficient power so that the AIs don't declare war on me. They seem to be pretty busy killing each other anyway.

My immediate goals are to get liberalism, the Taj and to continue slowly expanding, to maximise the chances of coal and oil popping up in my borders.

 

[Meister Maggi]

Nice game!

I settled in place built two wboats, worker and another wboat for exploring and after a warrior went for the great lighthouse which I finished at around turn 58 as well.

Exploring (more or less) diagonally gave me the circumnavigation bonus .

I settled one city on the sugar and another one the island with the pig, then I grabbed another island in the direction of the pirate Sparrow and removed him with some swordsmen. The next victim shall be the vicious pirate since he/she D) also forgot to connect some metal.

I will either go for conquest or domination (though this seems painful).

 

[ShannonCT]

500AD progress:

Settled in place and teched Mining->BW->Sailing->Masonry. I settled on top of ivory before starting the GLH. After settling a third city on top of sugar and finishing GLH, I started building axemen to rush Vicky.

Rush succeeded in taking London, Nottingham, and York, all lovely cities, including the Hindu holy city. I then added some cats to the stack and went after Hannibal. 5 more cities in the bag. At 500AD, I had 15 cities.

I notice certain AI are exhibiting some odd behavior. First of all, Mad Viking has only 1 city! He hasn't been at war with anyone, and he has room to expand. Sparrow and Long Kon only have 3 cities each at 500AD. Only Perry is behaving as one would expect, with 7 cities. They're really making conquest easy for me. It feels like a Prince/Monarch game. The only annoying thing was losing circumnavigation very early despite my two workboats exploring on a diagonal line to complete both East-West and North-South exploration.

Amsterdam is shaping up very nicely. I built GLH and Colossus there early. I got an Engineer at low odds and built the Mids there. When I got Lit, I built Great Library and National Epic there. Now I have another Engineer sitting there wondering what to build. Maybe a quick Oxford or MoM.

Techwise, I recently finished the CS-Paper-Education beeline and am starting some Unis to enable Oxford. I'm teching Philosophy. No other AI has Philo because I killed off the Taoism founder (Hannibal). This should make Liberalism go quite a bit later. I should be able to take Medicine with it.

Yes, that's right folks. It's time for Sushi milking! This map should have an obscene amount of seafood and rice. My test maps indicate it could be 80+. Each resource gives .75 food per turn, so we could be looking at 60+ food per turn from Sushi. A 400K score should be very doable and 500K may not be out of reach.

 

[VerbalKint]

Wow ShannonCT, very impressive. May I ask how you did that axe rush? Do you build barracks first? And how many axemen did you have before you declared?

 

[ShannonCT]

Wow ShannonCT, very impressive. May I ask how you did that axe rush? Do you build barracks first? And how many axemen did you have before you declared?

Yes, I built a barracks first. I declared with 4 axes. London had 3 archers. My first 3 axes died, badly wounding the archers. The 4th won, leaving 2. I galley chained over 1 more to set up a possible amphibious attack. Next turn, there were still only 2 wounded archers, so by land and by sea, I took London. Reinforcements took the other 2 cities pretty easily.

 

[Sleepless]

I think like most people I settled in place and built the GLh around 1880BC. Second city was built on the pig/copper island. Reading other spoilers it probably should have been built on the phants but happy with it anyway. Third city was built near Lisbon, at the time I was building it as a staging post to Joao so very happy when I found Iron there as well. Fourth on the sugar. I've had 2 GPs both GMs, I used one on Currency and the second on CS.

Main builds have been galleys, swords, cats, axes, tiremes and elephants. I though about going for Viccie earlier. Still haven't mapped her lands but decided on Joao first. With Lisbon on a hill and axes/swords as defenders I waited for Cats before attacking. I took another of his cities before signing a peace deal although I will be back later.

I've got a couple of turns left on Machinery so with maces on there way its time to go for Viccie. Unfortunately it will take me some time to get my troops over to her. No navigation bonus . Enough time to whip some maces though.

 

[Adama]

And then as Usual things did not go as well as expected. I went right further east, to secure the Iron there (forgetting that I would have to build a fort, and could not mine it. Doh! #1.

----------
BTW a prctical question, I made a few screenshots, how can I insert them ??? thanks a bunch.

Help! I wasn't successful in securing the east island iron, though it was mined, roaded, etc. and within cultural borders. It sounds like you are saying it requires a fort to become a usuable resource if it is on an isolated island? Can you help me by explaining if that's the correct procedure?