News: BOTM 80 Results and Congratulations

[DynamicSpirit]

Well most, but by no means all, of you managed to extract some kind of victory against the various Germans. This game had a higher than usual number of challenger entries, which meant both the silver and bronze medals went to challengers - sossos and hhhawk! (Must be something about repeated letters in players names that helped in this game ) Jovan Kukic picked up gold with a 1230 AD domination, while sossos's challenger silver was for a remarkably early 1320AD diplomatic victory.

Congratulations to all who won this tough emperor game!

Summary of Medal Winners:

Jovan Kukic: 1230 AD Domination Victory, 360,763 points.

sossos: 1320 AD Diplomatic Victory, 306,516 points.

hhhawk: 1625 AD Domination Victory, 303,906 points.



Fastest Finish Award Winners:

Jester Fool: 1630 AD Religious Victory, 233,414 points.

bcool: 1730 AD Spaceship Victory, 231,268 points.

SteelHorse: 1590 AD Conquest Victory, 223,588 points.

WastinTime: 1220 AD Cultural Victory, 65,030 points.



Other Award Winners:

Matty B: 1909 AD Diplomatic Victory, 79,257 points.

pattontwo: 1909 AD Domination Victory, 60,056 points.

whb: 1904 AD Spaceship Victory, 38,390 points.

c00per: 1941 AD Cultural Victory, 10,929 points.

MarleysGh0st: 1905 AD Cultural Loss, 8,734 points.

Orel: 1977 AD Spaceship Loss, 3,864 points.


>> See the full results here.
>> See the updated global rankings here.
>> See the latest Pantheon of Heroes here.
>> Award symbols are listed here.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Here's where everyone settled.

Having the chariots to start with meant you had the chance to explore quite a bit before setting, so it's no surprise that most of you discovered and then settled near the gems!

The Small Print:
The numbers by each player's name indicate the turn settled on (starting turn is 0). Players are colour coded by game class (challenger=red, adventurer=blue). Symbols indicate victory condition, if there's no symbol then the player either retired or was defeated. The yellow border indicates the land that was visible at the start of the game.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

One of the extra challenges in this game was to figure out how I chose the AIs (with any answers in the spoiler threads).

Noone managed to get the complete answer, although whb was the first to correctly get part of the answer, with this comment:

PS. The leaders obviously seem to be something about adopted homelands / influence -- Einstein moving to the US, Karl Marx influence on Russian politics, Prince Albert being Queen Vicky's squeeze, Arnie also going to the US (but isn't he Austrian?), etc. Not sure why the choice of those particular German/nation combinations though (or why 3 Germanies).

That was all correct - so kudos to whb. Your opponents were all historical people from Germanic areas.

The missing bit of the answer was: How did I pick the Civ leader types? Why was Victoria playing Angela Merkel, Lincoln playing Prince Albert, etc. Well, the answer was: It was actually based on physical appearance. (I actually thought that would have been obvious as soon as people saw Brennus's (playing as Karl Marx) bushy beard, but evidently not....) Obviously the appearances weren't that close because I didn't have a choice of that many Civ leaders to pick from (especially for the women!) but that was the connection.

(or why 3 Germanies).

That was just down to a shortage of sufficiently famous 'Germans' who had emigrated. I simply ran out of suitable historical German figures who were sufficiently well known that most people would probably have heard of them, and who were associated with other countries! So I had to fill in with some extra 'Germany' opponents.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Then there was this sub-competition:

As a sub-competition, there'll also be a mention to whoever completely eliminates Jorchen Löw's team on the earliest in-game date - this will be based on what you report in the spoilers, so you won't get the mention unless you report it. (Note however that eliminating Jorchen Löw's team is not a precondition for winning an award.

And the winner here is certainly a surprise. It appears to be...

Arnold Schwarzenegger of the Native American Empire (playing in whb's game). Our AI champion achieved this feat on the remarkably early (for an AI) date of 1150AD.

That is of course - unless anyone did better but didn't report it in the spoilers (or if you did and I missed it )

 

[c00per]

Congrats to medalists (IT'S OVER NINE HUNDRED THOUSAAAAAANDS!!!) and awards winners
Congrats to c00per for getting the awesome slowest award

WastinTime: 1220 AD Cultural Victory, 65,030 points

And the winner here is certainly a surprise. It appears to be...

Arnold Schwarzenegger of the Native American Empire (playing in whb's game). Our AI champion achieved this feat on the remarkably early (for an AI) date of 1150AD.

That is of course - unless anyone did better but didn't report it in the spoilers (or if you did and I missed it )

Wow, didn't know that Arnold Schwarzenegger plays CIV and GOTMs. Would be nice to get a comment from him about this.

 

[whb]

Wow, didn't know that Arnold Schwarzenegger plays CIV and GOTMs. Would be nice to get a comment from him about this.

I got in touch via the diplomacy screen, to see if his strategy was part of a nuanced philosophy about balancing risk and reward in the early expansion phases of the game. Anyway, this was what he had to say. Oh well, it's Arnie I guess.

 

[WastinTime]

WastinTime: 1220 AD Cultural Victory, 65,030 points.

Espionage Victory. In case you think this was a particularly well played game. It wasn't that great.

 

[Deckhand]

Espionage Victory.

I knew that, but
I just checked and realized fastest culture would have given nocho an Eptathlon.






Thinking about this, what we are currently doing (sometimes having Espionage count separately and sometimes as Culture) is probably fine. Doesn't always force players to do Espionage if they want fastest (only when it is allowed ). Not sure anyone would try it if it didn't count. Anyway when I make BOTMs, I will sometimes allow it and sometimes award it separately.

Spoiler :

like we do with events

"variety is the spice of life"

 

[WastinTime]

Thinking about this, what we are currently doing (sometimes having Espionage count separately and sometimes as Culture) is probably fine.

I like this 'new' victory condition, but I don't like playing HoF games and trampling on the traditional culture games, so I haven't submitted any there until they add a new category for it. Therefore, when it's allowed in the BoTM, I'm motivated to try it. It's an interesting puzzle to optimize this strategy. Maybe if it had its own award people would compete for it.

It's also a great way to get around the 'jesusin chokehold' on culture I'm surprised more people aren't using this to get their culture win.

 

[WastinTime]

I knew that, but
I just checked and realized fastest culture would have given nocho an Eptathlon.

I rarely look at that, but doesn't he need a 'cow' award too?

 

[Deckhand]

I rarely look at that, but doesn't he need a 'cow' award too?

Only for vanilla and warlords; BTS Eptathlon is harder, you need a Gold Medal, but not the cow.

 

[c00per]

I got in touch via the diplomacy screen, to see if his strategy was part of a nuanced philosophy about balancing risk and reward in the early expansion phases of the game. Anyway, this was what he had to say. Oh well, it's Arnie I guess.

Good old Arnold the Barbarian.

Espionage Victory. In case you think this was a particularly well played game. It wasn't that great.

Wow. Such late. So bad played. Not much date. Very not culture.
Imho whatever means you used, it's still an amazing date

 

[nocho]

I knew that, but
I just checked and realized fastest culture would have given nocho an Eptathlon.

Haha, just when it seemed jesusin had finally given up on claiming every single cultural award in BOTMs, WastinTime tries to perfect his espionage culture skills. Just my luck.

 

[WastinTime]

Haha, just when it seemed jesusin had finally given up on claiming every single cultural award in BOTMs, WastinTime tries to perfect his espionage culture skills. Just my luck.

Come to the dark side, nocho. Play an espionage game.

 

[Mitchum]

It's also a great way to get around the 'jesusin chokehold' on culture I'm surprised more people aren't using this to get their culture win.

That's how I got my culture win a few months ago. Although, I think Jesusin has been missing lately but so have I so I'm not 100% sure on that.

 

[nocho]

Come to the dark side, nocho. Play an espionage game.

If you come over to the clear side and I cross to the dark side then just maybe we have equal chances. I might wanna try the espionage culture thing though, I even was in r_rolo's infamous succession game that tried the whole thing out years ago. By then it was just a weird variant game, never did we realize it was actually the recipe for a glorious short cut to traditional culture.